Male Eclectus Parrot: The “I just unlatched the food bowl door and climbed out but are you going to stop me from escaping?” look.

There seems to be one in most people’s flocks. The evil-minded escape artist. You know the bird. The one that you think is safely resting in their cage but is secretly biding their time waiting for the chance to unlatch their door when you aren’t looking. That’s nothing though. If they get bored with a simple escape, they’ll go and ...

Goffins cockatoo, Theo

Of all of the mistakes we make with our parrots there is one that stands out over the rest. It is something that we often do unconsciously, but sometimes very consciously. Sometimes it happens just because we don’t understand not to do it.

Unfortunately, it is one of the most damaging mistakes we make, and creates problems that are some of the hardest to fix: in a word, it is inconsistency.

It doesn’t sound terribly evil, does it? Actually, though, it is among the worst of all our sins we ...

Q: I live in Florida where the humidity levels are very high. Should I get a dehumidifier so my bird isn’t uncomfortable?

Pam G., Cape Coral, FL 

A:  Contrary to popular belief...

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Rainbow Lorikeets

We’ve all got one of those people in our lives. Who hasn’t got a lovely person who has a knack for calling you at the worst possible moment? Like when you’re elbow deep is dirty dishwater, like when you’re watching a movie and it reaches the important bit, like when you’re trying to convince your parrot that it wants a syringe full of medication (without being bitten) or when you’ve just sat down to a meal you’ve spent hours preparing.

I’m related to ...

Yellow collared macaw

I think it might be fallout from a particularly hormonal spring season, but recently I have read an abundance of comments from people who feel at their wits ends with their birds. It’s not uncommon to be reading complaints following breeding season, but they are usually tempered with a sense of relief. Not so much this year.

I was absolutely floored to hear that a long time bird-pal was thinking about giving up her flock because she just didn’t think she had another spring season in her. Even ...

The only times I find myself getting annoyed with another bird owner is when I offer them advice and they immediately shoot it down: “you’ll have to come up with something different – my bird will NEVER go for that”. They insist on using words like “stubborn” or “scared” or “disinterested” to describe their birds. I find that these words often also describe them.

In contrast, my favorite owners are the ones who not only accept the advice they receive but also modify it to suit their ...