SURRENDER
IT MATTERS WHERE YOUR BIRD GOES NEXT.
The surrender application can be found at the bottom of this page.
HAVE YOU DONE YOUR RESEARCH FOR WHERE TO SURRENDER?
To decide if Birds and Beaks is the right fit for you, please spend some time looking into our organization. Check our reviews on Google and Facebook. Read through our website, our interactions on social media on Facebook, TikTok, Instagram and the like. Check out our group on Facebook, Birds and Beaks Nation.
Sometimes, we have a wait list to be able to get birds into the rescue. If you can’t wait and it’s an emergency - we’ll visit those decisions on a case by case basis. If we’re too full, your options are to continue caring for the bird until we have space, or we can refer you to other local rescues that might have space.
ALL RESCUES ARE NOT CREATED EQUAL.
Please, please be careful where you place your bird. Do the same checking for any other rescue we’re asking you to do here. If a rescue is awesome, they’ll earn awesome feedback and reviews.
If we are full and you would like a referral, send us a message and ask us for one. We regularly work with other reputable rescues in and around Michigan, Indiana, Ohio, Illinois, Missouri and Wisconsin. We’ll be glad to give you feedback on your choice if we cannot house your bird.
Don’t just put your bird up for sale on Craigslist or Facebook Marketplace or any of the groups or pages you see on the internet. Birds are used in scams, and birds are coveted by bird flippers.
A bird flipper is a person who takes your bird and turns around and sells the bird without any qualification to anyone whom has the money to buy them. There’s no vet care, dietary requirements, cage requirements, interaction requirements or health requirements. It’s just a money transaction, as if your bird were not a sentient creature with feelings, needs and an incredibly intelligent brain.
BE CAREFUL! Even if we can’t help right now, we care about you and your bird. Feel free to message us on Facebook or send us an email to inquire about potential homes or rescues that you might be considering. We will help if we can.
OUR RESCUE CYCLE, EXPLAINED
Birds are surrendered for a million reasons. Death, terminal illness, divorce, life circumstances change, financial health changes, allergies, family members move in - literally all sorts of reasons.
Here at Birds and Beaks, it’s not our job to judge you. It’s our job to be here for these birds, and since you’re visiting a rescue we respect your will to get them into a safe environment to make sure their next chapter in life is a good one.
You’ll never be treated less than for finding a safe place for your bird, or your loved one’s bird.
Phase 1: QUARANTINE & MEDICAL CLEARANCE
When birds first arrive, we place them in our quarantine room, away from the rest of the current residents. Our facility has separate air spaces, heating and cooling for the different sections of the facility to control the spread of illness and to be able to ensure the health and wellness of all.
Quarantine sounds like a scary/sterile word. Really, what it means is we’re just keeping them apart from the rest of the flock until we know they are healthy and are not harboring any disease or illness. The quarantine space is shared with our Founder’s office/workshop and as such there are usually people in the room with the birds mostly all the time.
While in quarantine, birds are seen by a veterinarian. Our every day vet is (the incredible) Dr. Melissa McNally of Jolly Road Veterinary, and we also use our good friend. Dr. Scott E. McDonald, and occasionally, MSU lends us their hardworking students going through the University’s veterinary program.
Birds in quarantine go through their initial medical exams - and we handle anything outstanding medically. They go through any initial grooming for beaks and nails, and we get to know them as little individual souls, taking into account everything their surrendering parties told us on their surrender application. We do not clip birds wings as a general practice.
Birds in quarantine are transitioned to the rescue diet which is bar-none the best we’ve seen in rescue.
PHASE 2: BIRDS BECOME RESIDENTS
When a bird becomes a resident here, they are moved to the area of the facility that has like species. They have their picture taken and put on Petfinder, and we create a Petfinder ad for them using all the information we’ve gathered through the process. It is at this point the bird becomes “adoptable”.
Every day, we cycle birds out on play stands, and get them out to interact with the humans. We almost never let birds interact with other birds unless they are already bonded, as it poses risks of injury and it’s just harder to place them if they make a bond while here. Once a bird is bonded to another bird, we do not separate them for any reason.
We have volunteers that hang out with them regularly, and our core team interacts with them regularly and we do fun things like dance parties with them.
This phase lasts for as long as it takes. The longest a bird has been in our rescue is four years before they found their “Happily Ever After”.
The average length seems to be around 60-90 days.
And, we’ve never met a bird who was “unadoptable”. We don’t think that exists. There are birds that are harder to work with than others - but there’s no such thing as a lost cause**.
**Except Al, but…even Al will eventually meet the right person. Probably. If Shannon goes missing, it was Al. If Al goes missing, Shannon has no idea what happened to him. File it with the JFK Assassination, Jimmy Hoffa and all those weird crop circles from a few years back.
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**Except Al, but…even Al will eventually meet the right person. Probably. If Shannon goes missing, it was Al. If Al goes missing, Shannon has no idea what happened to him. File it with the JFK Assassination, Jimmy Hoffa and all those weird crop circles from a few years back. ***********
PHASE 3: ADOPTION
Our adoption process is thorough. Think of us as the Tinder for birds, but much, much safer.
We check out the individuals, their homes, their family life, their vet, their history of owning animals, and after the application process is complete, we vote as a team whether or not to put an animal in their care.
When we choose humans for birds, we do so by matching the human personality with the birds we have in the facility at that time. We try to get a good idea of what bird ownership looks like in the imagination of the applicant, and then we temper that down to reality, and we take the information we have on the birds provided by the previous family, along with our understanding of who they are as we know them, and we match them that way.
When a person is approved for adoption, they are approved for a species or size range of bird, and they have to go through our preparation process to get ready for said bird. When they get here to the facility, we let them meet up with the birds of the species they’re approved for, and then we pull the birds that have personalities that would match with that person - and that’s the group they get to meet one at a time.
They spend one on one time with each of the birds, and it’s usually pretty clear when the bird chooses the human.
It’s planned kismet.
PHASE 4: HAPPILY EVER AFTER
We provide support to the families whom adopt from Birds and Beaks for life.
First - if it doesn’t work out for any reason, we have a return contract. Birds must be returned to the rescue and cannot be sold or given away.
Behavior problems are no problem. We have a behaviorist that provides low cost behavior help to birds adopted from the rescue.
We also have continued education, do live educational shows on social media, and produce content regularly that is aimed to improve avian husbandry and the interactive bond between human and bird regularly.
SURRENDER FORM
If you’ve decided B&B is right for your bird, fill out this form to see if we have the space and availability.
SURRENDER APPLICATION FORM
Please be as detailed as possible. We almost always have a wait list to get in but can usually work you in within a few weeks. If this is an emergency, please make your case why we should take your bird in before others to help us prioritize.
SURRENDER FEES:
We do not charge “surrender fees” here at Birds and Beaks. That said, we are a nonprofit organization who will provide medical care, proper nutrition, proper housing, in a clean, warm and spacious environment until they find their next set of humans, which will take as long as it takes. If you are able to donate, it would be very much appreciated. Visit our Donation & Sponsor page to help.
PLEASE - do not just drop birds off at the door at our facility. In order to make sure we have space, please give us a heads up. If it’s an emergency, we will always try to figure it out to make room for them, but surprises on our front steps are not fair to the bird or to us.