I spent many years as a commercial fisherman in the Gulf Of Mexico working as a deckhand on commercial fishing trawlers, shrimp boats mostly and was a Captain of two bay shrimp trawlers during the 1980’s.
My commercial fishing career ended in Fort Myers FL after I had grown tired of being ‘at sea’ so much of my life those years.
I got an apartment and searched out any job I could find nearby my apartment in Fort Myers that would pay the bills until I could decide what I wanted to do with the rest of my life.
A large franchise pet store hired me immediately with no experience as a bird salesman. Two weeks later with half dollar size bruises on my forearms, bandaids on every finger from being bitten by large Macaw parrots I realized why I was hired with no experience.
The large parrots in the store had been there many years. Only the family of the store owners could handle them. I was paid a low hourly wage plus commissions on sales of pet birds so I often tried to handle the larger birds. Macaw parrots. So I could get them tame enough to sell for the higher commissions.
Eventually I did become successful getting budgies, parakeets tame enough to sell. In the bird sales business if little Susie get’s bitten, drawing blood by her bird of choice Mommy won’t buy the bird. So it was very important to the store profits and my own paycheck that I be able to sell lots of birds, bird food, accessories, cages etc.
Working the bird sales job for many months I learned also how to groom pet birds. Trimming wings, beaks and toenails. The trick being able to get a bird calm enough to sit still while the groomer snips off a few flight feathers, nips toenails and shave back the end of the beak so it does not get overgrown preventing the bird from being able to eat.
After I left the pet store to pursue paychecks in other occupations I continued to practice my bird grooming skills with friends and neighbors pet birds along the way in my life.
About eight years ago some of my friends that had seen me work with pet birds, grooming parrots encouraged me to use my experience with pet birds to develop a business.
I first tried to develop bird training and grooming videos. Found this work to be very time consuming, expensive and far outside my own personal tech skills and experience. I have also much of my life been interested in technology. My Mother provided me chemistry sets and educational electronic kits from radio shack from about age 12.
Since about 1993 I self educated myself in website development, personal computer repair, web server administration and other related tech skills that really came in handy when I decided to start the internet radio show: Bird Talk LIVE Online.
January 2015 I had been online for about two years experimenting with the pet bird training and grooming videos. I was not doing well enough with the production work and could not afford the more expensive equipment and personnel I needed to produce a marketable product.
I was not looking to get rich. I did want to do something with the many years of experience I had grooming pet birds. Every grooming session was a very memorable experience. Sitting in the living room of a pet bird owner, their family, children telling me all the stories about their pet bird while I groomed their bird often turned into two to three hours of story time about their bird. I loved every minute of this. I also enjoyed the reward helping others with their pet birds from my many years of experience. Many people would say things like: ‘you are a bird whisperer’, ‘you should do this for a living’, ‘we didn’t know this about our bird until you came here to groom him/her’.
During the grooming sessions I would actually teach them how to groom the bird themselves. Sharing everything from my experience in the pet store and along the way in my life working with pet birds so they might be more successful and have a more enjoyable experience with their feathered loved one.
January 2015 I was online looking for a way to educate as many as possible, reach as many people with pet birds or thinking about having a pet bird so they might benefit from my many years of experience. More importantly that their pet birds would benefit as well.
I found internet radio shows online. Thousands of them. Most of them were music DJ shows. People DJ’ing copyright music, streaming music shows from their homes LIVE on air and pre-recorded LIVE shows.
In elementary school I did a mock radio show as a class project. It was a big hit. Junior high school I directed West Side Story. The entire school and parents came to see the production. It was also a big hit.
Remembering my love for production I decided to try my hand at producing and internet radio show for pet bird owners and people thinking about having a pet bird.
I started out by going LIVE on air and sharing the link to the LIVE show on Facebook and my own websites encouraging people to call in LIVE and share their pet bird experience LIVE on air.
Nobody called in. I spent many hours and days going LIVE on air waiting for callers but not one person called in.
I talked with other internet radio show companies and found that it is very rare to be successful with a LIVE call-in talk radio show online. Internet radio is not like AM or FM radio. Most people just listen but don’t participate.
I reached out to some avian professionals online and asked them to be a ‘guest speaker’ on my LIVE show at a specified date and time at their convenience. This worked very well and is how I got started with what is now a very successful internet talk radio show.
Five years now on air, I sit in front of the microphone in my internet radio studio and enjoy the stories again. Like the many hours I enjoyed the bird love shared with me by the families that owned pet birds I groomed in their living rooms.
‘That you may be more successful with your feathered loved one’.