A few years ago, I wrote about my intention to connect to my parrots via video calls while I travelled. I realize now that I never followed up on what has turned out to be a very effective way of keeping in touch when I’m not in town.

Fortunately, I don’t travel quite as much now. When I turned 75, I decided that the three-trips-per-month schedule of my life had to change, and now I’m generally down to one trip a month (although there are exceptions, given that I don’t have any control in scheduling conferences). Even so, I’m gone from the lab more than I would like, and although there is a small army of research associates catering to his every need in my absence, making sure that Griffin knows he isn’t being abandoned by me is high on my list of priorities.

The ease of calling, of course, depends on where I am…When I’m in the US, arranging for a call generally isn’t much of an issue. I can always take a short break, wherever I am, with at most a three-hour time differential…so making sure that I call before Griffin’s 8pm bedtime is almost never a problem. When I am in places like Dubai, with an 8 hour time difference, or Japan, with a 13-hour time difference (and, of course, international dateline problems), things get a LOT trickier—there are only very short time windows in which to make a call. I’ve found myself calling using an internet “hot spot” from a colleague’s car on occasion! (Of course, they’ve really enjoyed seeing Griffin, too!)

Phoning Home

As I mentioned in the earlier blog, we are not exactly sure what Griffin observes over the video. Parrots see in the ultraviolet, and cell phone cameras are optimized for human vision. People’s faces probably have little or no UV components—unlike parrot feathers—so probably he does see a reasonable replica of me on the screen. We aren’t even sure how well he can hear and recognize my voice. Maybe it is just that I’m the only one who engages video calls with him, so he has associated the sounds from the phone with me. Nevertheless, he always bends down to touch the screen to give me ‘kisses’. In any case, he seems to find the experience as something positive and absolutely not aversive, and I definitely like to see how he is looking in my absence. He’s also learned not to request ‘tickle’ from the phone, thus he understands something about my not really being present.

So, is a phone call a good substitute for my presence? Not really…When I am in town, Griffin will spend at least an hour a day on my hand, getting tickles and preening himself; we spend additional time together in sessions; and while he eats his afternoon birdy snacks, he likes to have me nearby, eating my human snacks (things like carrots, which he absolutely hates—so no sharing!). None of those things can be replaced by 10 minutes on a phone. But is a video call better than nothing?….For sure.

When I return from a trip after calling, I am much less likely to receive the ‘cold wing’ treatment, and if he does ignore me at first, he engages in such behavior for a much shorter time period. Thus, while traveling, I am very likely to schedule my day around a short window in which I can ‘phone home’. Even when such scheduling is truly difficult, I remind myself how much I both appreciated and disliked ZOOM calls with friends and family during COVID: Nothing could replace a real hug, but sharing news and seeing the faces of loved ones certainly made life a bit less miserable!