I have to tell you about Pandora, my yellow cockatiel. I got her when she was 6 weeks old and I adored her. At this time, I lived in Durban in a block of flats that did not allow dogs but they said ‘yes’ to birds and that is how Pandora came to live with me. She believed with all her heart that she was a human being. No, seriously, she did. She thought that whatever I put in my mouth she could eat too. I had to explain to her that no, she would not enjoy yoghurt. But she saw it going into my mouth and I was obviously enjoying it…why wouldn’t she? It was only after tasting it off my tongue that…okay, I could have a point. When I’m eating chewing gum she was a bloody pain. She was mad about biltong and also was quite keen on red wine!

One night she was sitting on top of her cage and made it very obvious that she wanted to come to me. I collected her, put her on my shoulder, went and sat down and continued reading my book. But Pandora wasn’t happy with sitting on my shoulder and ventured downwards until she was sitting on my stomach. Then she burrowed herself underneath my pyjama top and seemed quite happy to stay there. An hour later I got ready to move to bed. I called Pandora out and put her on my shoulder and stood up.

An egg rolled out of my pyjamas! Fortunately I managed to catch it. Pandora had laid an egg on my stomach!

My darling bird. She was treating me as a daughter would her mother. She wanted to give birth with Mum there to hold her hand. Sigh!

My Pandora……….