She’s for the Birds--and Proud of It

People who know Donna Gerber affectionately call her Big Bird, and there’s a good chance her own birds think of her the same way.

And for good reason.

Most of the other Orange County Bird Breeders sell their birds, but “I couldn’t part with mine,” says Gerber, who has a flock of about 50 fine-feathered friends in cages at her Costa Mesa home. “If they have babies, I just have a larger family.”

Those are in addition to her three children, four dogs, cat and fish.

“People ask me how I remember their names, and I ask how do they remember the names of all the aunts, uncles, cousins and other family members they have,” she said.

And Gerber, editor of the bird group’s newsletter, treats her birds as if they were children.

Birds are like little kids, she says, and that’s why they are treated like little kids.

“It takes a lot of time to ensure birds have good health and to provide them with good nutrition,” she said. “They don’t have many pleasures in life except for eating and playtime.”

In the Gerber household, that means regularly leaving their cages for one-on-one play and to participate in other activities such as watching television or taking a shower.

“A couple of them like to take a shower with me,” said Gerber, who is a night supervisor at Postal Service station on Sunflower Avenue in Santa Ana.

Despite the fact that she did not show any of her birds at the recent bird breeders annual fair, Gerber played a major role in organizing and running the event.

“I’m not really a bird breeder,” she said. “I’m more into having them as pets.”

Make that talking pets. She has trained most of her parrots and cockatoos to say phrases such as “I love you,” “Gimme a kiss,” “Whatcha doing” and “Hello.” And her African gray parrot knows how to bark like a dog, she says.

“Birds pick those words up easy because it’s the things they hear the most,” Gerber said. “I’m trying to teach one of my birds to say ‘Let me out of here.’ I want to surprise my daughter with that.”

Birds have not always been a major pursuit for her, however.

“My divorce in 1975 changed my lifestyle,” she said. “I started buying a bird here and there, and soon had a lot of them.”

When she was younger, she said, Gerber had fun belonging to a 4-H club, through which she raised dogs and later trained and rode horses. She noted that she was a four-time president of her club.

Animals such as dogs and horses are basically domesticated, Gerber says. Birds are different.

“Birds are only one or two generations out of the jungle and still have that natural instinct for self-preservation,” she said. “You have to develop a different attitude when working with birds.

“You can’t dominate birds, but birds will do anything for you if you work out a compatible relationship.”

Gerber envisions making birds part of what she hopes will be a new career--running a plant nursery.

“Birds will be placed in aviaries around the plants,” she said. “Now, doesn’t that sound nice?”

Tustin High graduate Erin Cunningham, 18, is already setting records as a plebe in boot camp at West Point.

Cunningham established a women’s record of 18 minutes, 40 seconds for the 5K run, eclipsing the previous record of 18 minutes, 57 seconds. She competed with 135 other female plebes.

Cunningham also took first place among the women in a physical fitness test and placed 15th overall in the event.