My Blue and Gold Macaw “Fid”, likes to drag grass up to his sleeping platform and roll in it.

Having seen photos in recent blog posts or on the BirdTricks.com Facebook page, a few people have been asking about the foliage in my cages? What exactly is it? What do the birds do with it? What do I do to prepare it before I give it to them?

Musk Lorikeet: Otto is the first to bite if he senses something is wrong…

My house has been a wonderful place to live lately. No one living here has been inundated with work. No family member has had to go into hospital. I haven’t been upset because someone ran into my car in a parking lot and didn’t leave a note. I haven’t blown up any essential electrical appliances like a computer hard drive. My recently acquired expensive replacement high-pressure water cleaner that is ...

It’s essential that whatever cage your bird is in (transport, sleeping or day cage) has appropriate bars to prevent injuries, escapes or an accident. All it takes is for a bird to get too curious (like the galah in the pic above) and your bird could be in trouble.

One of my friends was recently shopping for a new cage for her parrot when she remarked in frustration to me that it’s extremely annoying that cage manufacturers don’t seem to make cages with just ...

Blue and gold macaws

Periodically, I write a post to remind everyone to try to keep stress from entering into their dealings with their birds. It is sometimes hard to avoid. Parrots are complicated creatures that we struggle to understand and uncertainty creates stress.

There are some topics that are very complicated which cannot be ignored. Nutrition is one of them because a bird’s health relies on a good diet. Safety issues are another for obvious reasons. But if you have questions there are places to go, such as here, where ...

My elderly Galah/Rosebreasted Cockatoo is around 64 (human) years old.

This is the longest blogpost that I have ever written so I give you that warning and apologise for the length but I’m trying to be fairly comprehensive as this information isn’t easy to find if you need it. (Don’t worry – I believe in using pictures to break things up!) This post contains information for a stage of life we all hope our birds will get to. If your bird reaches old age ...

Goffin cockatoo, Theo

A couple of weeks ago, I was cleaning Theo’s cage and noticed one of a parrot owners most dreaded sights: the tattered remnants of feathers – evidence of feather destruction.

Whenever we discover feather destructive behaviors (FDB) in our birds it is heartbreaking, but this was a particularly distressing discovery for me given Theo’s background.

I took Theo in about 6 years ago from a home where she had lived for almost all of her life – she was 23 at the time. It was a good home and she ...