I had a parrot growing up. Well, my family did, I suppose. My dad bought a Senegal when I was about 15. It passed away when I was in my early 30ies.
They are indeed highly intelligent and social animals. It bonded with my dad the most. I was his second favorite. It didn't like anyone else.
As awesome of a species as they are, I can't help but feel guilty for keeping a bird caged and indoors their whole life. He definitely was neglected during the last few years of his life as it was almost like caring for a young child who never grows up. 20 years of that and you're going to be drained, especially as an older person with responsibilities.
Anyone thinking of getting a parrot as a pet, I strongly suggest you ask yourself. Are you willing to care for a bird who is as demanding as a young child, constantly, for decades?
The positive side is they do bring you closer to nature and enrich your life in ways you couldn't imagine.
I love parrots, they make fantastic pets. However, your comparison to a small child is very good - they have the nature and intelligence of a human 3 year old.
Parrots are wild birds, they have not been domesticated for ten thousand years like dogs, and it is probably not humane to keep them in a cage. If you want a happier parrot, then get a breeding pair. They won't be as affectionate their owner though, as they have a mate.
They make terrible pets. They need large cages/rooms, must be kept in pairs or groups, they are prolific poopers, can be loud as heck, pluck their feathers if you are away (or not), destroy furniture ...
Unless of course you keep a single hand raised parrot in a small cage and don't much care about its well being. Then they make fantastic pets.
I am not sure about your comment about not caring for the bird's well being. We have a very small parrot in a very large cage. As long as he gets out of his cage to play, gets lots of head scratching, and my wife or I am in the same room as our parrot, he really seems happy. Also, it is easy to know when a parrot is happy, bored, or unhappy. Lots of signals.
There are also little things that mean a lot, at least to our parrot: at meals, if our food is not healthy for a parrot, one of us will put something good for him on our plates, and we always make a show of 'sharing' something on our plates with him. This communal eating seems to be important to him.
Another thing that seems to make him happy is to sit on my shoulder while I am working at my computer. He is not really a distraction and he seems to enjoy it. I try to cook with him on my shoulder but he wants to rummage through food ingredients laying about.
Yet another thing to do is understanding the bird's natural desire is to forage for food. What to do? Hide food and let him find it.
EDIT: I should also say that whenever someone likes our bird and talks about getting one, I try to talk them out of it. It takes a lot of effort to have a parrot and if that effort, over several decades, is not a lot of fun for you then getting a parrot is a bad idea.
Well, big cage is already better than small cage. Keeping them as single birds is not optimal though.
My point is though that keeping single parrots in cages which are too small makes them a lot easier and cheaper to keep. Less area to clean, less potential for destruction, and single birds engage more with their Humans. It's just not really a situation were they thrive.
I won't go into why the scientific consensus is that parrots need conspecific companions. But it's not so much about being happy or bored, but more about meeting social needs and exhibiting the natural behaviors.
You are making it sound much, much worse than it actually is. As it stands they make good pets if you have the time to give them the attention and freedom they require. They're very affectionate and if you pick the right type of parrot for you it will not be loud.
As with dogs, they're terrific if they have a good owner and absolute horrors if they don't.
my wife at the time convinced me to get a cockatiel since she grew up with birds. Her tolerance to noise as a Japanese is very different to mine as a European. (Japanese can sleep anywhere, I sure can't) The bird we had is very small in comparison to the parrots discussed in the article but the noise they make is not to be underestimated. And you can't turn it off. Yes you can throw a cover over the cage but you can't cover it for longer than what they need sleep.
It was very hard for me to endure the constant noise (never ending screeching) which felt like Chinese water torture. That bird drove me absolutely insane over time. To me it felt like the bird was so loud exactly because it was incredibly intelligent but it used that intelligence to be jealous and protective and the intelligence was probably the cause of its unhappiness (since it knew it was in a cage).
My wife loved that bird to bits but to me it felt like I was taking care of a disabled child that is not mine (bonded with my wife only) and which would never grow up. It became more nasty and mean to anyone except my wife even it was hand-fed as a chick. Knowing nothing about birds when we got it I thought I'd be able to manage it (after all I grew up around cats, dogs, and farm animals so how hard could it be looking after another animal?). But it just got worse and worse and still is horrific today. I am no longer with my ex and that bird was at least 20% reason of why I could no longer live under the same roof.
Seriously don't get a bird unless you have lived with it for a couple of months. Once you have done that think of what it would be if you live with it in a more stressful period of your life ... Could manage that animal at a time when you are looking after your new born children? When you are up to your elbows in baby diapers and chronically sleep deprived?
After seeing this animal in captivity for so long I have grown somewhat disgusted with the idea of birds as pets. I guess it takes a very special breed of people to keep birds and be OK with it: The type of people who see a bird and go: "You see those beautiful creatures that are able to fly. Yeah, I'm going to make them stop do that."
I had a similar problem, right down to the breed of the bird and the nationality of the wife! I managed to dodge a bullet though, because she slowly realized that being close to the bird made her break out in hives. The day we found some to adopt that vile reptile was a happy one.
They're demanding in that they are highly social animals, so they can't really be left alone for long periods. They need affection/interaction.
They bond with humans just as humans bond with each other. So they really do become almost like a family member. Because of their intelligence, it's not just like having a dog who you can throw a ball and walk down the block.
I suggest reading and watching videos of Alex the African Grey. Really eye-opening into the learning abilities and reach of intelligence which birds possess.
Oh Christ yes. A friend of mine had a parrot that'd start to remove keys from his keyboard if it wasn't being paid attention to. Rather annoying when you try to play games with friends.
This is why I gave up my parrot to a lady with an entire room dedicated to a cage for her birds. A very nice new home. I also was tired of the poop... And squawking.
How do animal lovers generally justify the caging of birds? I've always seen it as a sketchy idea. Does it negatively affect the birds behaviour? Not something I know a lot about to be honest.
What exactly is sketchy about forcefully inhibiting the primary form of locomotion for a certain life form in order to feel more powerful and in control?
I’ve kept budgies (parakeets) all my life, and occasionally I’ll post a picture on social media and get the inevitable “keeping birds in cages is cruel” backlash. It invariably comes from people who do not keep birds.
Budgies love their cages. They clean them, they rearrange them, they make them into a perfect environment in any way they can. Introduce something they don’t like and it’ll end up on the floor. Introduce something they do like and they’ll probably move it because they weren’t happy with the placement.
With the pair I have currently, the whole front of their cage opens up and I open it every day. Usually the male has a five minute fly around the room, lands on the cage, then climbs back in. The female usually doesn’t even bother because she’s far too occupied with housekeeping and making angry noises because he’s not with her.
I can’t speak for the larger parrots having never looked after any, but budgies love their cages.
> Budgies love their cages. They clean them, they rearrange them, they make them into a perfect environment in any way they can.
Not to be insensitive, but this is a fallacious conclusion. The lab I worked at did fatal experiments on rodents who were also kept in cages. Some of them were known to personalize their cages after they were rearranged by humans. Human prisoners are known to do the same thing to their cells. Many inmates fill their cells with personal belongings and arrange things until they are satisfied. We can't really conclude that rats, inmates or budgies love their cages.
Eventually a limiting environment can start to feel like home. It's possible that the animal would choose to stay in a limiting environment as opposed to being released in the wild, because they are literally unfit for the wild.
We have a ‘crate’ for the dog. It’s a cage. However if it rains, I use the hose or he has been bad, he runs straight to it and get in. I don’t know what it is about he, but it’s where he goes when he wants to be safe.
I had several small-to-medium sized parrots until I became allergic to them. (Cockateil, Senegal Parrot, Sun Conure, Monk Parakeet)
None of them really liked their cages but would tolerate being put in them at night. What they really loved was hanging out in the garden window in the kitchen, they could see most everything going on in the house and our backyard. Great as long as they didn't see a hawk out there, then they'd be freaked out for the rest of the day.
My cousin and uncle bought a parrot together a few years ago. They absolutely loved it. My uncle would go out to get the mail with the thing on his shoulders every day. Then, about 2 years ago, my cousin passed away unexpectedly, and my uncle was heartbroken for the loss of his 26 year old son. Fast forward a couple of weeks, my uncle still is in mourning, but gets the courage to get the mail and return to a normal life. The bird was on his shoulders as usual. Out of nowhere, a hawk lunges at him and snatches him up from his shoulders. It all happened within an instant. The entire neighborhood must have heard his wailing. I shudder just to think about this unfolding.
For anyone with such pets, please don't drop your guard down, especially if you love your pet like a member of the family. Predators such as hawks and the occasional coyote or bobcat do roam cities and are closer to us than we're aware.
True that. I had a cat who was very good with dogs - it became an outdoor cat over time. Then one early morning, in the driveway right outside our bedroom window we heard a terrible fight which turned out to be a coyote trying to kill/eat our cat. I got out there in time to run the coyote off, but the cat died in mine and my wife's hands minutes later.
That morning I taught my daughter how to bury a pet which was incredibly tough, heart wrenching experience - but that's how closure works I guess.
We've had another great, sweetheart of a cat for years now - and she's also amazing with dogs. I still find myself waking up in the night to check that she's in the house.
Last year we lived in a rental with a decent beach view. One afternoon our parrot spotted a kite surfer near the beach, and full-on froze rigid for 10 minutes until it went away.
We guessed that she thought it was some kind of massive hawk. Poor girl, must have been terrifying. Haast Eagle has been gone for a long time, but she doesn't know that.
Ha! Ours were the exact opposite, they would fly into the living room and scream their heads off for a while, but then would be on high alert for the rest of the day, getting spooked by any sudden movements.
You're justifying what is animal equivalent of institutionalization (I'm sure there's a more technical term for it for animal behavior). I recall reading about a behavioral phenomenon, where a neglected, abused animal (a large feline, if I recall correctly) was kept in a tiny cage it could only circle around in endlessly, no room to even pace. Once let out into a far larger enclosure, it would still perform this circular pacing despite having plenty of room to roam free. Do you suppose it really "loved" its old cage so much?
I may add that I too kept a budgie for 13 long years.
I've seen a bear still running in small circles in a 3.500m² compound in a zoo after being relocated there from another zoo (where they might have shot it). The reason for the circling (not enough space) was explained to us by the staff of the zoo. They said it'd wear off after a couple of months.
Bear "Max" was 7 years old at the time (in 2000 or 2001). The 20 year old mother "Alma" was not running in circles. After the mother died in 2007, it seems the bear was held alone for 10 years. Max is still alive and with a partner now (Animal Park Olderdissen, Bielefeld, Germany).
I've seen this myself in Belgrade zoo, Serbia. Wolves running around in cages not much bigger than my budgie cage. It's not OK. However this shouldn't be used as a straw man to argue against what I said regarding budgies considering the huge phylogenetic distance between birds and mammals.
I’m really not. When I first got the most recent budgies I was working from home and the cage was open all day so they were free to roam. They quickly made it their home and seldom left because a) that was where the food was and b) as a pair, they need somewhere to potentially build a nest.
You said you kept “a” budgie. They are highly social creatures and do not like being kept alone.
I don't quite follow your line of reasoning. Accessible food reinforces behavioral habits, so of course the cage with the food would quickly become their home. How then, exactly, can you quantify that they "love" their cage, as opposed to a large aviary or even freedom to roam in the wild? And I'm not going to make assumptions about your home decor, but most modern homes are neither furnished nor accessibly to birds, posing an immediate danger more than anything. The familiarity and safety of a cage may then be more enticing than flying around a home, and I certainly noticed this behavior in my birds (e.g. loud sounds would send them flying back to their cage in a fright, and in general a reluctance to come out).
The fact that captive animals can adapt to their cages, like a man does to prison, doesn't mean this is good for them nor that it's justifiable. And unlike a man, a captive-raised animal cannot comprehend anything else. You have chosen that life for them and are justifying it.
As for my singular budgie: one outlived the other by many years.
Aren't most of our cities are glorified prisons? There are billions of people who are confined to their homes for their lives especially in developing countries either due to economic reasons and or social reasons (just saying I dont own or justifying keeping a bird in the cage )
I have a strong opinion on this. As a child, I saw our pet parakeet get depressed and lonely even as we provided him the best material care we could give. We let him around the house regularly, and he once escaped, but loved my father and came back when my dad climbed a ladder into a pine tree he had perched in. The bird eventually died a bitter, antisocial death, annoyed with human attempts to play with him, but lonely and longing for company.
Sure, we should have gotten a pair, but these animals are not meant to live in little cages. Yes, some can be content, especially in pairs. But it's fundamentally unnecessary to keep them in cages like that.
In nature, they are far more likely to end up as prey than to live a long happy life.
Street cats live to the age of 5 on average. House cats live until 13.
Freedom is a fantasy.
> I can’t speak for the larger parrots having never looked after any, but budgies love their cages.
Would they return to their cage if it was opened outside? IME very few would.
I much prefer doing things like feeding wild birds, this has all the benefits of bird ownership with none of the down sides. In time their friendly enough to to pat and nag when it's dinner time.
No, they’d freak out. They would completely panic, get lost, and then get eaten by a cat or die of cold.
I also feed wild birds. Everyone should. After having to bury a whole clutch of sparrow fledglings a few months ago after a cat got the nest I’m pretty sure my budgies - spending the entire day happily grooming each other, playing with toys, and enjoying unlimited free food - have a better time than them, though.
I've been considering getting a budgie for a long time. Is it ok to keep a single one? How much attention to they need every day? I'm out all day for work, but I could give it attention for hours in the evening and early morning. Also, what is an appropriate cage size? I live in a small condo.
I wrote an initial answer to this which was basically "get a pair!" and then decided to start again.
As a child, I had a lone female budgie. She was completely tame - almost "post-tame" to the point that she knew you weren't a threat so was quite OK with biting you to make a point if you tried to get her to do something like the perpetual ladder game. I'd get back from school and she'd sit on my shoulder all evening chuntering into my ear.
When I started my degree she - age 10 - had to move on, so I gave her to a friend to look after. The friend had, until recently, had a pair of budgies, but sadly was left with just the male. Upon introduction the two lone budgies bonded immediately in a completely heartwarming display. She lived for 2 more years happily with her new mate, and I always felt guilt for keeping her on her own all that time.
Fast forward to now and I have two budgies together, and they're really happy. They're all over each other all day. They have arguments, and they work through them, and they end up smooching and grooming and feeding each other again. They're so loving they're gross.
But do I think my first budgie was unhappy? No, I don't. She was fine, she just identified with people for most of her life.
Then, do I think these budgies as a couple are happier than she was? Yes, I think they probably are.
Ultimately it's up to you and how you want to care for the bird. If you want a super tame bird and you think you can provide enough time for them that they won't be lonely, you can make the decision to get a single budgie. If you want them to be able to have fun on their own when you're not there, get a pair - because then they don't need you.
Both of my current budgies are finger tame, but for them interacting with humans is mostly an annoyance. They will get curious and start chatting with you if you come to the cage, and they will get on your hand - but if they hear the other budgie that takes priority. One thing I haven't tried is getting two young birds and taming them independently before introducing them to each other...
Cage size I think within reason the bigger the better. Tall thin cages work well if your space is restricted, since vertical space is usually more readily available.
Perches/twigs taken from live trees. I have hazel and apple in the garden so that’s what they usually get (and destroy) but check the wood is OK for budgies before giving it to them. All parrots love destroying things, and providing perches to strip is a good way to satisfy this urge without letting them eat an entire sheet of sandpaper. Basically just throw suitable foliage in there and they’ll find something to do with it.
Swings of any variety. You can make them from thick metal wire (thick enough that they can’t twist it themselves), optionally with a wooden perch part or make the whole thing from wire.
Ladders!
Small mirrors with caution, and not if you’re trying to tame them. They may “redistribute” food onto the mirror for their inverted friend. Interestingly in my current pair the female seems to pass the mirror test and the male doesn’t!
Bells, but make sure they can’t pull the clapper out and potentially swallow it. One of my previous budgies used to hit the bell, then was annoyed by the sound and so would attack it. The sound then obviously got louder and she would attack more violently, and so she kept herself occupied for quite a while.
It’s also nice to give them something to bathe in, which they may or may not take to. It needs to be a very shallow plate of water, and don’t just leave it in the cage or they will defacate it in and drink it afterwards.
They need cuttlefish bones and iodine blocks for bird health. Unlike dogs they won’t overeat, so even if you put lots of millet (budgie junk food) in there they will stop when they’re full. Useful if you’re leaving them for a couple of days because you can just provide extra food.
With my pair the female passes the mirror test, and has as long as I've had her. The male didn't when I got him, but he does now. She seems to have taught him about his reflection.
And definitely go for a big cage. My pair is in a 2'x2'x4' cage, and I feel it's probably too small for them. They spend their days outside of it, of course. And I only clip their wings when I need to travel with them (moving from one house to another).
Don't overfeed seed. Pelleted foods are a good base, but provide fresh fruit & vegetables daily.
Interesting regarding the mirror test! There’s so much about these dinosaurs we don’t know yet.
I’ve never clipped but I totally understand. I just cover them up and remove swings but driving with a spooked budgie isn’t fun.
Fresh fruit and veg are always there, shouldn’t have omitted that. Millet OD is only if I’m leaving them unsupervised for a weekend which is very rare, but they are very sensible with how much they eat.
My wife and I have an Timneh African Gray parrot and she is basically our child and who we miss most on vacation.
Unlike the typical Congo African grays on the market, Timnehs are smaller, and tend to enjoy spending time with just about anyone but trust/recognize their regular keepers the most. They tend to make better family pets. (Congos can also be worked with to trust more than one person but it is typically much harder)
She is not clipped and has free reign of the apartment when we are home with perches (and poop trays) everywhere she knows to fly to (usually). We also do flight training and often take her with us on walks. She is a very capable flier as she demonstrated in her 3 day adventure outdoors looking for my wife (who was out of town).
She is slightly evil and plots ways to get attention. She gets very jealous of anything we give too much attention to other than her and has thus destroyed 2 laptops. We named her GlaDOS.
Grays are known to do contextual communication and not just random mimmicry. Ours is no exception. When we come home she yells "Hello?!?!" until we take her out. When she wants to cuddle (which is often) she makes a stomach grumbling noise and demands to be let under the covers where she learned said noise.
We have had guests feed her treats since she was a baby so she readily flies to the shoulder of most people.
Sometimes she will randomly look at you and say "What do you do?!".
They are not for everyone but if you have want a small highly intelligent animal you can form a strong bond with and are prepared to look after for 40+ years then parrots make amazing family members.
African Greys are some of the most sought after parrots, with their population plunging dramatically as people hype up African Greys, including their ability to mimic human speech.
I love them and wanted them as a pet but after reading up on it, so does a huge amount of other people for such little supply of African Greys. I've decided to stick to domestically bred pets now.
Sadly, African Greys may head for extinction in the wildlife like the dodo.
DON'T buy a parrot figuring that it will be a fun surprise for me. To
acquire a parrot is a major decision: it is likely to outlive you. If
you don't know how to treat the parrot, it could be emotionally
scarred and spend many decades feeling frightened and unhappy. If you
buy a captured wild parrot, you will promote a cruel and devastating
practice, and the parrot will be emotionally scarred before you get it.
Meeting that sad animal is not an agreeable surprise.
My parents have African Grey parrot.
I urge everyone who is thinking about having a bird.
1. DO NOT BUY A BIRD. In few years, you will realize that birds need to fly and not sit in the cage most of the day.
They are wild animals.
2. If you still want to have a bird, have them in pairs, so they would not be that lonely all the time.
In general I think we should not keep such animals as pets ever. Unless you have the time and commitment their lifes will just be miserable. Same for dogs like border collies. They have a need to be busy and stimulated and most people can't provide that making the dog bored and neurotic. I hope one day we will realize that pets are not just toys you can buy whenever you feel like it.
I had a border collie years ago, and I can’t agree enough. If he didn’t get the chance to run and play and work every day, he’d get really anxious. You could tell when he neeed more stimulation because he’d sit on his bed and suck on some sheets he likes to chew on, and just stare at you. I had an active life and so did my family, so he was rarely bored, but the average person would be at a loss.
Plus they are so unbelievably smart, as in significantly smarter than a very young human, and think of how much trouble little humans get into when bored! He was a good boy though, incredibly loving, and in the 99% of times we could meet his needs very happy. We’d run around for a couple of hours in a nearby mountain wilderness, then go home and take a nap together.
> In general I think we should not keep such animals as pets ever. Unless you have the time and commitment their lifes will just be miserable.
Starting with an ultimatum and then immediately undermining it with an “unless” seems counterproductive. I wish people would realise that not every comment has to begin or end with a sensational assertion.
My grandfather, an owner of an African Grey Parrot, died in his early 80s. His final years were marked by lung disease and a hacking cough.
After he died, it was always a bit weird to visit my grandmother as, for the remainder of his life, the parrot (whose name I cannot recall) would hack away in precise imitation of the cough which killed our old grandpa.
Parrots are highly problematical pets. They have demanding requirements, which aren't met by "traditional" parrot keeping. The cage needs to be big, much rather they need a room to themselves. They need conspecific companionship, even if they don't want it, they can't satisfy their social needs with only Humans or different species.
Imprinting on Humans should be avoided at all cost, even at the expense of diminished tameness.
Behavioral problems in parrots seem to be the norm rather than the exception. Add to that the destructive nature of the parrot pet trade, and you get one nightmare of a pet.
We have a re-homed king parrot, and it's very hard to decide what's best for her long-term welfare. Getting a second bird to give her proper companionship seems like the best option but then you have to decide whether to make it the same breed (temperament/compatibility match but would become very insular and likely outright hostile to us as keepers), opposite sex (then you end up with a breeding pair which has it's own problems but does make them happiest if they successfully bond... big if and risky).
I'm already planning a gigantic indoor aviary build to give her more freedom during the day when we're both working, but companionship is it's own huge problem for such intelligent (and more importantly I think, emotional) creatures.
I've had a parrot since I was 8. They are basically perpetual two year olds. He has a sense of humor though. He would call the dog to the cage, throw food at him and laugh.. sometimes with a British accent. Not sure where that came from.
Fun fact about parrots, they can teach another parrot to talk, but that parrot can't teach another.
Also don't consider getting a parrot unless you understand it is a 30-50 year commitment that takes active daily social interaction. They are great but they are a big commitment.
Side note, it tooke twenty years to actually witness him sleeping.
I have no personal experience in this matter, but through watching videos of bird training experts (in my case [1]) I learnt that parrots can be trained to be friendly with the entire family. Parrots might still prefer one family member, but it can be trained to get along with everyone else too. Of course matters get more complicated if the bird has been previously owned and has developed a bad personality.
Had 2 pet cockatiels (a pair) while growing up, not sure I would again. We allowed ours nearly free access to fly wherever they wanted in the house (and it was a decent sized house with several lofted ceiling areas) and we also had a small dog they interacted with (we were also a family of 4). While they seemed happy, were incredibly funny, friendly and made great pets, they were also incredibly demanding. While it was fantastic that they'd sit on the couch with the family while we watched TV, or with one of us while doing homework, it was less awesome when they'd perch outside our bedrooms to wake us up to play with them. Thankfully they can't see for shit at night, so they went into the cage on their own when it got dark.
Imagine seeing a creature with the freedown to fly and thinking to yourself "I'm going to capture that creature and keep it in a cage for my own amusement"
They are indeed highly intelligent and social animals. It bonded with my dad the most. I was his second favorite. It didn't like anyone else.
As awesome of a species as they are, I can't help but feel guilty for keeping a bird caged and indoors their whole life. He definitely was neglected during the last few years of his life as it was almost like caring for a young child who never grows up. 20 years of that and you're going to be drained, especially as an older person with responsibilities.
Anyone thinking of getting a parrot as a pet, I strongly suggest you ask yourself. Are you willing to care for a bird who is as demanding as a young child, constantly, for decades?
The positive side is they do bring you closer to nature and enrich your life in ways you couldn't imagine.