One pet owner in Singapore was successfully reunited with her pet bird after a gruelling 11 day-search, as well as the announcement of an impressive cash reward via social media.
Went missing on Sep. 27
YuHui Tay's three-year-old pet conure, affectionately named Gikgik, went missing on Sep. 27 near Jalan Kayu.
Tay mentioned in her Facebook post that Gikgik can fly, as compared to some other pet birds whose wings have been clipped.
Gikgik is also apparently familiar with the neighbourhood, as Tay had started to bring the parrot out on a harness to explore the area when it was just a fledgling.
Photo from YuHui Tay / FB
Tay subsequently posted several appeals on her social media pages for her beloved pet's return, and initially offered a cash reward of S$1,000.
Three days after Gikgik went missing, Tay doubled the reward to S$2,000 for the bird's safe return, and even added a line: "No questions asked."
Went around her estate like a "crazy lady"
Several well meaning members of the public who had seen Tay's posts called her to report sightings of Gikgik.
Upon further investigations, however, these tip-offs all led to dead ends, as the birds sighted were not the green-cheeked conure Tay had been searching so desperately for.
In an attempt to find Gikgik, Tay added that she had tried various methods of luring him out, which made her look like a "crazy lady".
"Walked around my estate like a crazy bird lady playing gikgik’s fav music everyday, terrorised my neighbours by blasting gikgik’s voice recordings loudly on my speakers at my 4th floor rooftop. Shared my posters repeatedly on so many Facebook interest groups, even when they are non pet related.
I tried animal communicators, handed out 350 flyers, pasted 100 posters, went to ghim moh with Cedric Soh from 12am-3am searching aimlessly, went to a shady “bird rehomer” place whom I suspected stole my bird (altho he didn’t, but the rest of the birds look....), travelled around Singapore north south east west literally! went to so many ppl’s house to view so many birds, helped another conure find his home, adopted another severely neglected green cheek conure who was on the brink of death from starvation."
In one post, Tay also urged any individual who knew of someone who had recently purchased a conure to inform her.
She stated that there have been cases where lost pet birds like conures and macaws, which fetch a heftier price then other types of birds, have been captured and resold.
Reunited
After spending "many many sleepless nights", Tay was eventually reunited with Gikgik on Oct. 7.
This was 11 days after the bird went missing.
Tay revealed that she had a received a call stating that Gikgik had flown into the caller's home, which is around 10 to 15 minutes away from where Tay lives.
"What a tearful reunion when we saw each other there was this sense of relief in both of us (or I ownself imagine my bird is relieved idk la hahahahaha). When I held him up, he quickly clung onto me and closed his eyes. Too emotional already that moment I cry. Hahahaha."
Although Gikgik did not appear injured, Tay said that it had lost a lot of weight, and was "extra needy at home and much much less picky with food."
Tay proceeded to thank everyone who had shared her post, and the support and encouragement she had received.
She also promised that she would no longer leave her windows open any longer.
"Finding a bird who can fly seems like an impossible task, with each sunset... but you guys kept me going! It really takes a whole village to find a lost bird and we did!!!!!!" she said.
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Top photo from YuHui Tay / FB