Umbrella cockatoo

Parrots are picky eaters. Which, when you think about it, is strange for an animal who spends the majority of its life in the search for food in the wild. You’d kind of think that they would be a little more forgiving when it comes to the meals we serve. Far be it for a parrot to make anything simple.

That leaves it up to we humans to figure out some way to get them to try the foods we know are good for them. Sometimes the answer has little ...

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It can be extraordinarily frustrating watching others successfully train their birds while you can’t even get your bird to look at the obvious types of treats available.  Not all of us have a bird that is happy to take a sunflower seed or something similar as a reward for training. I’ve seen many people give up on training for this reason.

Most birds will happily work for some sort of nut (favourites ...

photo by chieftanwildrice.com

Q: Is it okay to give my bird dried fruit instead of fresh?
Martine B., Stuttgart, Germany

A: Dried fruits have some wonderful advantages. They are small and convenient and they taste great. Being dry, they are perfect for use in foraging toys. When broken into small pieces, they are great for training. But there are some concerns about using them.

Fruits have a high water content and the drying (dehydrating) process simply removes the moisture. As a result, they shrink considerably in size. The biggest problem ...

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Photo by Jamieleigh
Location: Athol, ID
Pictured with: Alexandrine parakeet “Rasta”

With our parrot stunt show ParrotFX finally ready for stage, and the photoshoot concluded for it (as well as the training) I have finally had the mental space for Rasta full-time. Today is the first day that Dave and I haven’t been completely and entirely CONSUMED with something ParrotFX-related. It feels freeing. Now, we have about 7 or less days to produce our magic show for Silverwood Theme Park and I sit in ...

Rosebreasted cockatoo and congo african grey

The lining on the bottom of your parrot’s cage has a pretty straightforward job. It collects the things that land there and makes clean up simple for you. But it’s an important job, too, because it plays a part in keeping your bird healthy and safe.

We all know how important it is to keep our parrot’s environment clean and part of that is changing the cage liner frequently. So one question remains: what liner is best to use?

The answer is PAPER. Hands down, without ...

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Photo by Jamieleigh
Location: Athol, ID
Shown: Alexandrine Parakeet “Rasta” after a bath 

I’ve had Rasta since 9pm on May 8th and I have to say – he threw everything I thought was going to work with him right out the window.

I prefer working with aggressive birds over terrified birds any day. Why? All you have to do is phase out the aggressive traits and triggers, but with terrified birds you have to work on the bird itself before you can ...