BATON ROUGE – A pet cockatiel escaped from it’s cage, taking a four day tour of Baton Rouge before finding its way home.
TJ is a three year old cockatiel and the Robertson’s family pet. Kids Levi and Zoe love TJ; they play with him, dress like him, and even talk like him. When TJ escaped Sunday, the family was afraid of losing their friend forever.
“We decided to go in the backyard and play for just a little while. Well, TJ decided he was coming too. We were trying to sneak out but he caught us and flew out before we knew it. We were speechless, it’s something that when it happens you’re literally watching your bird fly out the window and you’re just standing there with your mouth open. You can’t do anything, you can’t chase him,” TJ’s owner Frankie Robertson said.
The Robertsons stayed hopeful that TJ would come back home, posting fliers to Facebook for any possible leads. Multiple bird watching groups spotted TJ and even took pictures of him in the wild.
“Seeing him fly really high in the air like that, I don’t know how many bird owners have footage of their birds actually in their natural element,” Robertson said.
Four days passed and many miles were flown before a miracle happened. TJ took a tour of Baton Rouge, going from Jefferson Highway to St. Alphonsus Church in Central on Greenwell Springs Road before making a guest appearance.
“There was a second grade teacher and her class outside, he landed on the teacher’s shoulder, which is his favorite place. The teacher took great care of him and the principal did too. They called the animal hospital where we retrieved him. I just find it so ironic that he found an area with a group of children my son’s age to nest safely with, it was just amazing,” Robertson said.
Now that TJ is home safely, the Robertson family is thankful and even donated the reward money to St. Alphonsus for being so good to their friend.
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