Mitred Conure

I took my umbrella cockatoo, Linus, to the vet last week.  His poops were runny and just generally not right.  I have to watch him closely because he contracted AGY (avian gastric yeast) last year, and it took almost a year to get rid of it.  It started out with the same symptoms: runny poops and a bad attitude.  I didn’t want to take any chances, so I had them run the tests, which all came back negative. Problem was, his poops still weren’t quite what they ...

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White Budgie

I was lying on my bed watching the History channel this morning, when Theo, my goffins cockatoo, toddled up to the side of the bed wanting to come up.  I swung my leg over the side of the bed and she hopped on my foot waiting for the elevator ride up.  She marched right up and took her usual spot on my chest, resting her head on my chin.

It was just a couple of minutes before I could feel all of her body weight on the side of ...

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Blue throated macaws

If you look at the skeletal structure of many dinosaurs, the link between them and parrots is a no-brainer.  Still, it took the scientific community forever to accept this as a possibility.  Down the road, it was proposed by a small group of paleontologists that some dinosaurs may have been feathered.  They were treated like lepers…until fossilized feathers were found among the remains of a dinosaur previously thought to be covered in scales.

The theory has been that parrots evolved from the theropod family, which includes the infamous ...

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Blue and Gold Macaws

If you choose to smoke, that’s your business and your right.  This post is about secondhand smoke, and how smoking around you birds affects affects their health.

What is secondhand smoke?

Secondhand smoke is the smoke that is emitted from a cigarette, from either the burning end or the filtered end.  It contains thousands of different chemicals that fill the air as either gases or particulates.  Following are facts about secondhand smoke by the National Cancer Institute and the EPA:

• “Secondhand smoke contains over 4000 chemicals, including 69 compounds that ...

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Blue throated macaw

The word enrichment means to enhance and make fuller.  It has become a very popular word among bird owners.  It’s a wonderful thing that humans are considering ways to improve their parrots lives.  I usually hear the word enrichment used in connection with toys and foraging opportunities.  These are huge ways to better a parrots life, but there are SO many other applications.

Enrichment means maintaining or improving health through diet and exercise. When our finicky eaters turn their beaks up at the new food you have introduced, ...

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