Feathers Flutter at Ramona Refuge

When their Oceanside pier cafe burned in 1977, Chris Elias and Lorraine Kellogg discovered a 13-acre plot in Ramona with 900 zebra finches and parakeets.

The Ramona Bird Farm took flight.

The couple, weary of the restaurant business, wanted their own land and a way to make a living. Their bird-breeding business was born.

Now, busloads of senior citizens, groups of schoolchildren and carloads of local families trek to the farm--where 2,000 to 3,000 feathered friends nest--for free tours.

“Some people drive to the end of this road and turn around to leave right away,” Kellogg, 61, said. “Others go inside, and you can’t get them out for what seems like 10 years.”

Elias, 58, enjoys giving visitors a tour of the farm, nestled in a valley 3 miles from the center of downtown Ramona.

The quiet expanse of open space around the farm and the serenity of the surrounding mountains contrast sharply with the excitable birds. As one employee said in describing the farm, “Every day, it’s cheep, cheep, cheep.”

Entrance into one of several aviaries on the property brings a cacophony of hoots, screeches, peeps and clucks from everything with feathers.

Elias said he isn’t sure exactly how many birds reside on the farm at any one time, since babies are constantly hatching or being purchased or traded, but once a month the feathered residents peck away at 3 tons of food.

The bird-food bill can top $1,000 every 30 days.

The four large breeding buildings and several rows of pens are home to birds from wild turkeys and pheasants to bluefooted Amazons, lovebirds and rheas--which look like ostriches, but have three toes, instead of two, on each foot.

In one enclosure, a golden pheasant male launches into a dance used to hypnotize his female companion. In another, a fat, juicy turkey struts his stuff, secure in the knowledge that the Thanksgiving celebration is a full five months away.

Multicolored yellow nape Amazons shout “Pretty bird,” and “Hello, hello,” above the din of shrieking parrots. In the breeding buildings, a flutter of wings and screeching from mother birds warn visitors away from the young.

A pair of emus, aptly named Hemu and Schemu, live in an enclosed pen between two of the breeding barns. They peer out at visitors with curious, doe-like eyes and seem to require an abundance of personal attention from Elias. The female emu’s eggs look like avocados, green with spots. She makes a noise that sounds something like a drum.

Elias coaxes Polly, a red, white and blue Amazon parrot, out of her cage. The bird nips his neck and runs back and forth across his shoulders before returning to her perch. Visitors can pet the various birds, but a warning that they might bite accompanies the invitation.

More than 100 varieties nest at the Ramona Bird Farm, including Amazon tacamans, an endangered species, and more than 20 kinds of finches, from cordon bleus to societies to red ears. No birds of prey are raised at the ranch.

THE RAMONA BIRD FARM

1798 Keyes Road in Ramona

Hours: Open daily, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Cost: Tours are free.