My galah Morgy enjoying a carrot. Does this bird look like she is dying to you?

We often talk about the importance of monitoring your bird’s weight and how you need to get it to a vet fast if you have a significant weight drop. We often don’t think of a weight increase as being equally as significant and alarming. We tend to think of a weight increase as being diet related, or basically an indication that the bird is too fat. There ...

Q: My cockatiel has a ring on its leg with letters and numbers on it. What is it for?

– Beverly F., Staten Island, NY

A: The ring is called a leg band and it is intended as a means to identify your bird’s place of origin as well as some other information.

The practice of banding began in North America a couple of hundred years ago by field researchers in an effort to keep track of the populations of wild migratory birds and local flocks.

In later years, as parrots became ...

My new purple sneakers

I recently bought a new pair of sneakers. They are purple and I absolutely LOVE them. Ok you’re all going to think I’m weird. Who gets that excited over sneakers? The thing is – I’ve been wearing the same pair of sneakers for over 20 years. If you do the maths you will realize that this must mean that I got my old pair when I was a child. I’ll admit it’s a little scary that they lasted that long; ...

blue fronted amazon

I was shopping at my local bird store the other day following a large shipment of new toys. I wasn’t there for toys, but I went from shelf to rack to bin with a huge grin on my face because they were so adorable, and as they are made by a private party, unlike anything else in the other stores. It wasn’t long before I realized that my arms were loaded down with toys of various sizes, shapes and colors and I had already begun placing them in ...

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Cockatiel Tinky

Moving is just no fun. It doesn’t matter whether you are doing it yourself or hiring someone to pack and do all the heavy lifting for you, having your life in total disarray for even a short period of time is just maddening. Welcome to my world.

After searching, I finally found a place that will work for me and the birds. Even though I am the only human that will be in occupancy, I have five birds and four are different species which made finding the right space harder ...

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Albatross in flight. The blue sky of summer, nice for a while but continuing extreme heat takes its toll.

The summer we’ve just had in Australia has been a bad one. We’ve had extremes all over the country. One half is under water, the other half is melting and that’s NOW. It’s not even summer anymore, it’s supposed to be autumn here. Yet I’m slowly cooking here in a record-breaking heatwave that exceeds what we’ve seen since records began at ...