I recently got to participate in an uber cool project. A very creative writer named Gaby Dunn decided to interview 100 people in one year. Her subjects are about as diverse as you can imagine. One title on her list was a zoologist/zookeeper. My degree is in zoology and I have certainly scooped up my fair share of poop in zoos, which apparently qualified me for the interview.
Gaby and I met in New York City, the night before Hurricane Irene was to arrive. The weather was picture perfect as we chatted over drinks and dinner, just a few blocks from the Museum of Natural History.
I will let Gaby tell the rest of the story. Here is the link to the interview. 100 Interviews
Like a lot of parrot lovers I was anxious to see the new Heidi Fleiss Prostitutes to Parrots program on Animal Planet. I had known it was in the works for quite a while now. The name Heidi Fleiss immediately conjures up all sorts of salacious stories and no doubt was the hook to get people to watch. However as a parrot person my hook was the twenty macaws! Finally a program featuring parrots. There are millions of parrot people who have been waiting for the world to learn what we already know. Sharing your life with a parrot can be truly amazing.
Clearly Heidi adores her parrots and her concern for their well being is genuine. I got that and I do think other parrots lovers could relate. However I do wonder about the folks who don’t have parrots?
The most important personalities overlooked in this program where the stars themselves, the parrots. Parrot people do tend to be labeled as crazy. Heidi herself keeps referring to herself as acting like a crazy parrot person. While there were a few things about her parrot care that could be less odd, I do understand why she loves her birds. But without spending some time focusing on what it is about parrots that makes them so important to her I don’t think the rest of the world got the message. Instead we see Heidi being obsessive and reclusive playing with a mob of macaws who don’t seem to do much of anything except take over the house and bite the hired help.
I know that is not the image I want people to see when they think about pet parrots. And I tend to think that is not what Heidi would want either. Television is a powerful tool. It can entertain but it can also educate. I think there is a huge opportunity to help people understand the powerful positive aspects of life with parrots. People can learn what makes them special, how to provide excellent care, what to do about those biting behaviors, how to provide a great habitat for them (and why spending $2000 a month on pistachios is probably not such a good thing for parrots.) I do hope if the show lasts beyond the pilot the producers will let us get to know the parrots. There is a story there that people want to see.
Right now it seems most television is about when animals attack, or about people who hoard animals or keep dangerous pets. It reminds me when it was OK to dress chimpanzees in tutus and have them ride bikes. People flocked to the attraction and money was made. However at some point somebody stood up and said that is the wrong message to send about animals. And now most of the world doesn’t support that type of animal experience.
I think we are at similar crossroads with animal related TV. Where is the television that showcases the positive impact animals have on our lives? I personally have no interest in those animal attack type programs and I have a feeling I am not alone on this one. Let me know what you think in the comments below and I will make sure to let Animal Planet know what you would like to see when it comes to parrot related television.
Today I was stroking my yellow naped amazon parrot Delbert’s foot. I was marveling at how such a little tiny creature would sit there so relaxed while I gently touched him. Seriously, it really is a moving experience when you think about it. An animal that can easily fly away from me or perhaps bite me hard enough to draw blood is allowing and enjoying me touching his feet. I think that is really cool. And in a weird way, a proud moment. The pride comes in because I know it is the choices I have made when interacting with my parrot that allows me this wonderful privilege.
Building trust with your parrot is a very realistic goal. What it requires is tossing out those old school notions about how to interact with animals. You are not going to be the boss, your bird does not have to obey you, and your parrot doesn’t have to do anything right this second.
Instead you are going to be your parrot’s partner, his provider of all things wonderful and most of all, you will be his friend.
Here are a few tips to help you start building a trusting relationship with your parrot.
1. Avoid using force to get your parrot to do something you want.
2. Avoid doing anything that creates a fear response. (You will need to learn to be very attentive to your bird’s body language so you know what the slightest fear response looks like.)
3. Avoid doing anything that creates aggressive behavior. (Just as with fear responses you will want to become very familiar with aggressive body language to avoid creating it.)
4. Empower your parrot to choose to participate. Let him walk or fly away when he wants to.
Some may be thinking “With my parrot having all that freedom to choose how in the world will I get him to be well behaved and do what I ask when needed?”….like step up when it is time to go back in the cage. This is where learning about how to train with positive reinforcement will be very important.
Positive reinforcement training will teach your parrot that when he does cooperate with your requests wonderful things happen. Like he gets treats, head scratches, cuddles or attention. Or all of the above! When you use this approach you get a parrot who can’t wait to do what you ask. And best of all you get a parrot who really enjoys interacting with you.
I get lots of emails about people having turned their relationship with their companion parrot around by following these strategies. I can’t wait to hear your story!
A veterinarian once said to me there are two times in birds life when it looks like it is dying. When it is dying and when it is laying an egg. It is no wonder I sometimes get emails from panicked parrot owners when they see their feathered friends “give birth” to an object that seems to be as big as their bird.
Egg laying can be problematic. Therefore if you would prefer your parrot be a companion bird and not a breeder, first be sure to avoid doing things that lead to reproductive behaviors. There is a great article about this in the free sample of the digital publication Good Bird Magazine.
But what do you do if your bird does lay an egg and you have no intentions of adding more parrots to the household? Here are a few tips to help you out.
If your parrot lays an egg, leave it alone for a few days. Watch your bird to see if she shows any interest in the egg. She may ignore it as first. Parrots often take a few days to lay a full clutch of eggs. This can be as many as three eggs. Leaving the egg alone for awhile gives your bird time to lay more if she is going to, and then wait and see if she decides to sit on them. Many parrots will simply ignore the eggs as times passes. If this is the case, go ahead and remove the eggs and throw them away.
However if your bird does show interest in the eggs, you will want to try another strategy. Parrots often show strong aggressive behavior when they have eggs. Wait for a moment when your parrot is not attending her eggs. Remove the eggs and addle them. This means to shake them vigorously. The goal is to break the yolk inside the egg. This will prevent the eggs from hatching if they are fertile. Then put the eggs back. Handling the eggs will not cause your parrot to abandon them. If you know the eggs are not fertile (for example there is no male around) addling is not necessary. Just let your parrot sit on the eggs.
During this time your parrot may stay tight to her eggs most of the time. She may eat and poop infrequently. And when she does eliminate it is usually in large amounts and sometimes smelly (from holding it for long periods of time.)
The reason you do not want to pull the eggs is that this can stimulate your parrot to lay even more eggs. To make the shell of the egg your parrot must pull calcium from other parts of the body. Too much egg laying can cause your parrot to be calcium deficient which can be life threatening for your bird.
Eventually when the eggs do not hatch your parrot will abandon them. Once this happens you are free to pull them and throw them away. It may take several weeks for your bird to give up.
Remember your first line of defense is to prevent egg laying by avoiding doing things that encourage reproductive behavior. Do this and you won’t ever have to worry about your parrot laying an egg. Of course if your parrot is a boy and he lays an egg, you might want to get your money back on your DNA sexing test.
Sometimes it seems there are a lot of rules when it comes to parrots.
Never have a parrot on your shoulder. Your parrot should always be clipped. Your parrot must obey the step up command. You must show your parrot you are the boss. Never let your parrot higher than your heart. Never let your parrot out when other pets are around. Your parrot must sleep in a sleep cage. Your parrot must get 12 hours of sleep at night.
That is just a short list of things we have been told about parrots. And I am here to say I do not ascribe to a single one of those rules. I am sure those rules were designed with the intent to help people with their parrots. However I often find when I challenge commonly held beliefs about animals it opens the door to a whole new way of thinking. And in many cases it enhances my life with my parrots and other animals in ways I never could have imagined.
Here is an example of “rule breaking” in my house and why it is absolutely permitted. I allow my pets to learn to interact with each other. I recently added a new member to the family. A bunny! Her name is Loretta and she is a Holland Lop Eared rabbit. Initially she was intended to be a temporary visitor, but it soon became clear she and I made a connection. My spare bedroom became her new home. She is litter box trained so it was no trouble to give her free range of the room. My two cockatiels also fly free in this room. They are skilled fliers and I quite rightly assumed if they ever felt uncomfortable near the rabbit they would just fly away.
However what I have discovered is that the rabbit is enriching for the cockatiels and vice versa. The rabbit will hop over to a pile of Timothy hay and immediately a cockatiel will fly down to join the bunny. I change out the litter in the litter box and everyone comes over to investigate. If I sit on the floor with the bunny, I immediately have a cockatiel fly down and land on my knee. Many times I walk into the room to find the cockatiels foraging on the ground while bunny is flopped on her side observing and relaxing.
It reminds me of when I worked in a behavior lab in college. There was a bunny and a crow that had free range of the lab. The two would often be found interacting together or with the same enrichment item. It also reminded of zoos that would put a snake in with a tortoise. There seemed to be evidence that the presence of another animal helped reduce stress.
I can relate. Some of my most relaxing moments are when my dog is resting by my side, while a parrot preens my eyebrows, or sitting with a bunny in my lap and a cockatiel on my head.
People sometimes are gravely concerned about having animals together such as dogs and parrots. Certainly some dogs may be a danger to another animal and are best kept separate. (Even rabbits are capable of some pretty scary stuff) However it is important to note that dogs can definitely be trained to behave around other pets. I have plenty of daily evidence in my home that parrots and dogs can coexist without incident. Rebecca O ‘Connor wrote a great piece about how dogs are very much able to differentiate their behavior around different birds. http://heckledbyparrots.com/blog/2008/12/dogs-parrots-some-training-tips/
I think we often underestimate just what learning machines animals are. Rather than placing rules and restrictions on everything I think it is wise to assess the risk/benefit for each individual situation. Then decide what works best for your household.
Despite being told for years not to allow parrots on our shoulders, I have found roughly 90% of every audience I lecture to does not follow this rule. My guess is that for those folks the benefits far outweighs the risk. And it certainly does in my household. Time to see if my Blue Fronted Amazon parrot is in the mood to sit on my shoulder and preen my eyebrows! This is one rule I look forward to breaking every evening.
Parrot people are pretty amazing. One of the things I find so wonderful about people who share their lives with parrots is that they often are the same folks who are saving parrots in the wild. Yup, it’s true. Parrot owners are a huge source of funding for parrot conservation. I love that!
The connection they make with the parrots in their home often leads to learning more about their wild counterparts and what is being done to protect them. I have to say that is exactly what happened to me. I had budgies as a child, but my first large parrot came into my life in 1987. Ever since then I have been fascinated with learning more about parrots. Not long after that I learned about a very unique parrot called the Kakapo.
This large (2000 gram) flightless bird struck me as the coolest parrot ever! I thought it was so interesting that the males climb mountains, build a bowl, suck in air and boom for a mate. For a behavior geek like me this is truly fascinating. When I also learned they were one of the rarest parrots on earth I became even more interested.
When I finally had a chance to visit New Zealand (the home of the Kakapo) I did my best to try to connect with the folks saving these birds in the wild. On my third trip to this beautiful country I finally had my opportunity.
The story of the Kakapo Recovery Programme is pretty inspiring. Kakapos were nearly wiped out completely by introduced stoats, rats, dogs and cats. Animal heroes such as Richard Henry and Don Merton went to great lengths to find safe island homes for the few remaining birds. These birds now live on Codfish Island and are closely monitored. Unfortunately they need more than an island to survive. They need genetic diversity, higher numbers and a plentiful food supply during breeding season. Different strategies have been implemented to address these issues and so far they seem to be working. Kakapo numbers are up to 131 individuals (from a low of 50). However as you can imagine 131 birds is still a small population and there is much more work to be done.
As a parrot enthusiast I wanted to know what I could do to help. As with any conservation project it requires people who care and of course funding to keep it going. We brainstormed some ideas on that day (and my head was spinning with even more on the flight home.)
Our visit took a pleasant unexpected twist. An opportunity to visit with some Kakapo chicks was possible. We only had one spare day to make it happen. The odds were against us. It was a 12 hour drive, flights were coming up as $1000! And time was not on our side. Miraculously we found a travel agent who found us reasonable flights. The next day however the airport closed down due to weather and our scheduled flight was canceled. We finally took off at 4PM. The next flight was delayed due to mechanical errors. My heart was sinking. Finally we made it into the air! We landed at our destination around 8PM and were whisked away straight to seven Kakapo chicks!
Have you ever met someone that awed you? That moved you? That made you want do important and worthwhile things with your life? Meeting the Kakapo chicks did just that for me. Knowing these individuals represented hope for the species and that each bird was so incredibly important made this encounter so emotionally moving for me. I could not stop replaying the events in my head for days. Here is a video clip of the encounter. http://youtu.be/GI4Q0KvaDD0
I hope the video gives you a little taste of the moment and hopefully moves you to take action to save rare parrot species. You can support the Kakapo Recovery Programme directly via their website. You can learn more about the Kakapo from the film The Unnatural History of the Kakapo. You can also follow Sirocco the official Spokesbird for the project on facebook.
The parrots in our lives give us such joy. I know every time I interact with my birds I will reflect upon my Kakapo encounter and be inspired to help parrots in the wild. If you have additional ideas to help raise awareness and funding please be sure to add your comments. Your ideas can help Kakapo and other species such as the Blue Throated Macaw.
I always find it interesting how knowledge changes. We are told one thing for years and then suddenly Whammo! There is undeniable evidence that what you have heard for as long as you can remember is inaccurate.
Remember when everyone used to think parrots were trying to dominate you? Thankfully that notion is for the most part eeking it’s way out of the parrot community. But here is one that I have often thought about and finally have evidence! Do parrots have a sense of smell? Certainly the physical evidence shows they don’t have a lot of receptors for scent. We are also told their taste buds are limited compared to ours. However we certainly see parrots respond eagerly to foods they appear to like. We can only assume taste must be involved in there somehow.
Scent on the other hand has still been a big question mark for me. I often ask myself if they have a poor sense of smell why do parrots emit such interesting odors? Those of you who have Amazon parrots certainly know what I mean. There is a very strong odor that seems to emanate from their respiratory system. That odor must mean something to someone. And my guess that someone is another Amazon parrot.
I have had this discussion with many veterinarians and we often come to the conclusion that perhaps they have scent receptors for that particular odor. However even with that information I have never noticed a parrot actively smelling something. I had never observed a parrot investigating something with his nares in the way a mammal might with his nose.
On a recent trip to New Zealand I finally met a parrot who clearly responds to smells. The bird in question is called a kaka. They are similar to a kea, but smaller and browner in coloration. The keeper told us this bird responded to smells. And she was right! He would press his nares against your hair or skin, inhale and then preen himself. You could actually hear him inhaling as he did it. The keeper mentioned they often offer strips of fabric with different scents on them for enrichment. She said he responds with great enthusiasm.
Here is a video clip of Robin Shewokis and me getting sniffed.
We were also told that a researcher is currently working on testing scent detection with kakapo, kea and kaka and has some interesting results. I can’t wait to read that paper when it is ready. Time to perhaps officially change one of the truths we have often held to be true about parrots. Exciting!
