considerations Before Adopting A Parrot

DIET

• Diet is the most important thing you need to get right. It is going to make the biggest difference in your bird’s behavior (think biting, screaming, plucking), health and overall wellbeing. 
• A whole food diet of raw veggies, grains, sprouts and cooked legumes
  • Fresh, frozen thawed or freeze dried (not dehydrated or cooked)
• Not all pellets are created equal
• Birds do need seeds & nuts but only a small amount as treats for training or foraging

SLEEP

• 12 hours of sleep
  • They require this much sleep just like we require 7 - 8 hours on average. 
  • Birds are photosensitive, which means they are very sensitive to daylight cycles. Consistently providing 12 hours of sleep year-round helps to prevent hormonal behaviors and, in females, unnecessary egg-laying. 
• No cage covers - hormonal trigger, unsafe to chew on, can cause territorial behaviors

TRAINING

Target Training

• Congratulations, as a new bird owner you are now also a bird trainer. Training just means “teaching”.Whether you mean to or not, you are also teaching your bird what to do and what no to do just with your behavior. “Every interaction is a training session.”
• Target training, though simple, is the single most important “trick” you can teach your bird. 

Step Up

• Birds are expected to step up like dogs are expected to sit, but unlike dogs sitting, a bird stepping up onto a human hand is not a natural behavior. We need to treat it as a trick and respect their refusal to step up rather than force it. Sure, you can force it - but that’s the best way to get a bite. 

PETTING

• Petting birds is a WHOLE thing. 
• It is not like petting a dog or a cat - the only appropriate place to pet a bird is on its head. 
• Innappropriate or excessive petting can lead to hormonal behaviors. This happens because petting your bird all over its body or even petting it too much is sexually stimulating to a bird. Hormonal behaviors like humping, regurgitating, and screaming, among many others, almost always lead to aggression. 

CAGE

• What size cage should you get? 
  • Bigger than you think
  • The bigger, the better
  • Birds should be able to fully extend its wings, turn around and even fly short distances in its cage OR be allowed frequent opportunities to fly outside of its cage in your home. 
• Material
  • powdered-coated steel or iron is most common but not long-lasting
  • painting with regular paint is not safe
  • galvanized steel is widely available and cheap but has a zinc coating - zinc is extremely toxic to birds
  • aluminum is safe and less expensive than stainless steel, doesn’t need to be painted, but not easy to find
  • stainless steel is the safest, lowest maintenance, longest lasting, but most expensive by far
• Bar spacing
  • If the space between bars is wide enough that a bird can squeeze its head through, it is a death trap for the bird. Ensure the cage you get has the appropriate bar spacing for the species you are getting. 

VET CARE

• Birds should receive a yearly wellness exam and bloodwork should be done every 1 - 2 years. 
• Birds require specialized veterinary care from an experienced avian veterinarian.
• Birds, being prey animals, hide their illnesses extremely well. In the wild, their lives depend on looking healthy because sick birds get hunted first. 
• Weighing birds regularly, understanding what a sick bird looks like, and regular checkups with an avian vet help to catch symptoms as early as possible. Even then, we often see symptoms only when the disease has progressed and the bird is critical. 
• Avian vet care is expensive where it is available.
• Avian vet care is not widely available. Many people live hours or days from an avian vet and in some countries, there are no avian vets. This makes seeking proper care extremely difficult. If there is no avian vet near you, how will you provide medical care for your bird?

HORMONES

• Hormonal behaviors (aka breeding behaviors) in birds is largely influenced by environmental factors such as a change in daylight hours, overabundance of food, physical touch, access to nesting materials and ideal nesting location, etc. 
• Since pet birds are not meant to breed, hormonal behavior should not be encouraged. 
• Hormonal behaviors are inconvenient but also almost always lead to aggression. 
• In females, hormones cause unnecessary egg-laying which, when there is no benefit of a baby bird, only comes with risks. Egg-laying can lead to loss of life for some birds. 

FLIGHT

• Wings are one of the things that classify a bird as a bird. Flying is the one thing only birds can do. Their entire bodies are designed for flight. 
• While wing clipping is often done with the intention of keeping a bird safe from flying into walls or accidentally getting outdoors, it is rarely actually safe for the bird.
• Many birds can still fly to some degree despite trimmed flight feathers - they can easily be carried by a wind pretty far and then not possess the ability to return.
• Wing clipping affects how birds use their bodies, limits their activity level, hurts them psychologically, increases biting, puts them at a disadvantage when faced with a predator (either an indoor dog/cat or an outdoor predator if the accidentally get outside).
• Wing clipping is also done under the pretext of “taming & training” them while their wings are clipped. The only thing that changes is the bird’s ability to get away. 
• It causes more biting since they can just fly away from something that makes them uncomfortable.
• It can damage their relationship with their owner.
• The unwanted behavior usually comes back when their flight feathers grow back.
• Some birds never psychologically recover from having their wings clipped.

SAFETY

• Toxins
  • Birds have a much more advanced respiratory system which means they are much more sensitive to toxins than humans or even other animals. Before bring home a bird, you will need to make changes is many aspects of your household to make it safe for a bird: 
• Pots & Pans
• Appliances
• Cleaning supplies
• Air fresheners
• Home repairs
• Certain foods
• Certain metals
• Plants
• Check out this free Household Dangers download.
• Pets
• Despite what you may see on social media, your other pets should not be “friends” with your bird.
• Dogs, cats and other predators could easily kill your bird, even accidentally
• Dangers of saliva
• Some larger species of parrots can also pose a real danger to small pets
• Flight
• Precautions need to be taken to prevent your bird from flying into a dangerous situation
• hot stove
• open toilet seats
• open doors
• sitting, stepping on, closing a door on a bird
• Clipping the bird’s wings is NOT the answer. You brought the bird into your home so you must adapt to a flying animal. 
• Bird Sitting
• You can travel without your bird, but you will need to either 
• Board them with a vet or sitter that is experienced with birds   
• OR
• Hire (and train!) a sitter that will come to your home at least twice a day while you are gone.
• Check out this free Bird Sitter Handbook.