Dear pet sitters,
we live in a small town in the beautiful, remote area in the south of Germany called Ortenau. Our rented apartment is light-flooded and calm. It has a 60sqm terrace with wonderful views over the city and up to the French mountains called Vosges. It is situated close to nature. Within a five minutes walk you can reach both the city center and the quiet forest. Unique areas are nearby, e.g. the nature protected area called Taubergießen, the famous mountains of the Black Forest, and the old volcano hills of Kaiserstuhl. The French border is just a 15 minutes drive. You could discover all the pittoresque old villages of the Alsace with their nice Christmas markets, but also the lovely towns of Strasbourg and Colmar.
At home, you'll have our nine beloved and very friendly bird pets as your companions. They are allowed to fly around the apartment all day long. Of course, that means more than the usual cleanups, but watching the birds romp around, compensates every mess they might make. We have eight Bourke's parrots and a single calm Barraband parrot, all calm and quiet. The Barraband needs a bit more human care and kindness, because he's imprinted on humans. All the birds are sweet-tempered, but nontheless, we'd be lucky to welcome an experienced and birds loving pet sitter.
We are looking forward to welcome another member of the wonderful housecarers family!
Warm regards,
Daniela and Stefan
As we think there should also be sitter's testiomials of houseowners and sits, we asked our latest sitter Michael for one. Here it is:
I house-sat and cared for Daniela's and Stefan's pet birds for two weeks in June Previously I had taken care of chickens and interacted briefly with raptors in wildlife rescue centers, but otherwise I had no prior experience caring for birds. I was intrigued by the idea, though, and sure I had a few initial worries.
The two weeks ended up being easy and fun. Their free-flying birds (inside-only) have individual personalities that you quickly get to know and enjoy. Lotzi, the one Superb Parakeet (thus larger than the others), especially was fun to interact with. He is human imprinted so very friendly and curious (especially when food is involved)! :)
Care and feeding of the birds is not difficult, even for bird novices. And yes there are tiny bird poops here and there each day to wipe up, but it is not cumbersome to do so since most are relatively dry. Maybe 15 minutes per day at most. Note at night the birds are in their cages and usually quiet, so not a problem for sleep.
Their contemporary apartment is very very nice and cleanly Euro-designed (I am a former architect, so I appreciated that). They also have a large outside patio that overlooks the town. The Internet is reliable and strong enough to browse/work on the patio, too. Just a few blocks away is forest land for lovely walks... foothills to the fabled Black Forest.
Lahr is a charming small town, and as an avid bicyclist I greatly appreciated the largely separate bike lanes everywhere. And I also appreciated D & S generously allowing me to use their bicycles (or car!) if desired. So a big two-thumbs up for all of those factors, too!
Last but not least, Daniela and Stefan are good warm people to know, interesting folks you might enjoy having as long-term friends. They communicated extensively and promptly before and during the house-sit.
So, I highly recommend this house-sit if you are up for something a little different than the typical cat or dog care situation. You won't be sorry!
Feel free to contact me if you have questions -- or want to verify I really wrote this! (I did.)
Sincerely,
Michael Feerer
s://michaelfeerer