Seattle Parrot Expo 2013 was an amazing success. Firstly, the vast numbers of volunteers, the hard work of the board, the participation of the Registrants and the support of the Sponsors and Exhibitors is truly the reason I can sit here and write this. Without any one person’s help from the marketing by Brandon to Jackie’s holding my reins to Jordan’s endless smiles all weekend long, I may not have survived. To say my heartfelt appreciation extends out to everyone cannot even remotely reflect the true feelings of seeing a dream of over 10 years come to life before my eyes.
Our first success begins with Dr. Susan Friedman’s LLA, Living and Learning with Animals (www.behaviorworks.org) course. We had a full house–75 out of 75 possible registrants! We chose Dr. Susan Friedman as our first Feature Presentation to start the Foundation off with a foundational knowledge of how behavior works. According to Dr. Friedman, we were the first organization to pursue animal training methods as a part human training credit. That was a really big honour to hear about! This is one of our key goals–applying what we learn about parrots to ourselves.
Our second success was the participation of our community. We were elated and surprised that over 1500 people came through the doors of the Expo according to our door people and counter. The kids loved playing the various games we had to offer with “Walk Like a Parrot” being the most popular. The loved our Face Painter, Raysizzle, and, of course, we filled the room beyond capacity for each parrot show we presented! Naturally, we attracted some great media attention like this article at the Seattle Times (www.seattletimes.com) and with other media outlets. We were so happy when Oly (my greenwing macaw) gave out our two Parrot Grants this year to two wonderful sanctuaries–Macaw Rescue and Sanctuary (www.macawrescueandsactuary.org) and Zazu’s House (www.zazushouse.com). They each received $1000 check and certificate “signed” by her.
I hope to be a better host and be even more gracious in Seattle Parrot Expo 2014. Why don’t you join us and see the magic for yourself?
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