Camelot macaws, blue throated macaw, Galah

Is the mess, the chores, the feeding, and the constant need for attention starting to get to you?  It’s called burn out, and don’t worry, you aren’t alone. There are some mornings that I get up praying that the cockatoos will find it in their hearts to refrain from their dramatics for just this one day. I often don’t get my wish. Today was my day off and I had a long list of things to accomplish.  As I looked over the list, I couldn’t ...

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In keeping in touch with the avian community, I find more and more people who are coping with the heartbreak of their parrot’s feather plucking, barbering or mutilation.  The biggest problem with feather destructive behaviors is that we don’t know why it happens.  There are NO experts in this area, because, frankly, no one understands why they do this. There are people with a great deal of experience with pluckers who can recommend changes to make that they have seen good results with.  But ...

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Blue Fronted Amazon Parrot

This is a topic I have covered in past posts, but an email I received today convinced me that this is a subject that can’t be discussed enough.

In this email, a young woman that I knew in Austin, told me that her much loved sun conure, Mango, had died unexpectedly.  She included her phone number, so I called her to offer my condolences.  In the course of the conversation, I found that Mango had indeed been showing signs of illness, but her owner didn’t know how ...

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Blue throated macaw

Motion sickness is caused by disorientation.  When you are still and seated in a vehicle, but you can see and hear the world whizzing by, a confused signal is sent to your brain.  The inner ear knows that you’re moving, yet you are motionless.  The result is sweating, nausea, and vomiting.  Though it seems like a trick of the mind, it is very real and quite unpleasant.  Parrots, like people, can be affected during travel.

There really aren’t any rules regarding motion sickness.  Some are affected by it, others aren’t.  ...

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Blue and gold macaw, Military macaw

So many people I know are learning how to build things for their birds – from foraging trees to play gyms to outdoor aviaries.  Maybe it’s the economy, or maybe we’re just tired of paying extreme prices for the things we know are necessities for our birds, and can build ourselves.  I thought it would a great time to do a post about safe building materials and construction.  Here are some general guidelines to use:

Always use parrot safe woods and lumber. Remember the ...

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