It can be extraordinarily frustrating watching others successfully train their birds while you can’t even get your bird to look at the obvious types of treats available.  Not all of us have a bird that is happy to take a sunflower seed or something similar as a reward for training. I’ve seen many people give up on training for this reason.

Most birds will happily work for some sort of nut (favourites ...

 

 

My male Eclectus Pepi, has been a flying nightmare lately. He has gone from being sweet, affectionate and talkative to being moody, unpredictable and often downright nasty. It happened overnight and hasn’t been accompanied by any of the usual signs of sickness.

 

Of all of my birds, it’s Pepi who seems to have the nastiest bite. He has this knack for getting a tiny bit of skin pinched in his beak. When something ...

 

One of the main problems that I have had with my Blue and Gold Macaw Fid, is getting him to settle at night. He cries when I put him to bed, he cries again when I turn off the light, he screams in fear if anything disturbs him and he often wakes up and starts making a heart wrenching, hiccupping sob noise for no obvious reason.

In my last post on Fid, I ...

 

 

The corrosive powers of lorikeet poo are truly amazing. There are days when it literally seems to eat away concrete. More amazing though, is the way a lorikeet can aim on a 45-degree angle. They are quite capable of painting any wall that is near their aviary and often seem to be doing so intentionally. You hear people say they’re messy and I guess from the human perspective they are, but they do ...

 

“Oh wow, you’re just soooooo fat,” my Eclectus Pepi has started saying to people in a very despairing voice. My voice. He picks his audience too. I have one relative who is particularly concerned with her appearance so naturally she is his favourite target. As he uses my voice – I’m the one that gets the blame for being rude. How dare I teach my bird to say that to her???

 

Ever heard the saying that if something seems too good to be true then it probably is? I think that’s what was bugging me about my Blue & Gold Macaw, Fid. I found myself with this beautifully good-natured creature that just seemed so perfect. I kept waiting for bad health news or for something to go wrong.

I put Fid through every screening test that my vet could think of; just to ...