Ice: Skittles new favorite thing

I don’t really know what triggered his sudden interest in ice.  I always share my drink with Skittles so long as it isn’t bad for him.  Recently, its mostly been ice water.  After getting enough tasty ice water, he actually bobs for the ice and tries to pull it out.  If he succeeds, he usually suddenly realizes it’s cold and lets go and shakes his head before trying to grab it again.  I guess he likes how it breaks.

In other news, I took Skittles with me to physical therapy after the earthquake in case there were any aftershocks.  He behaved remarkably well and I think that socialization has helped a bit with his aggression.  Even when I took him out of his cage around all those people he was calm.  Today, a man from our church stopped by and Skittles didn’t react negatively to him.  Instead, he happily chewed on the bottle cap I had given him.

All Day Play at Home

Something essential to any parrot’s well-being is play.  The average parrot should be played with at least an hour a day, though that doesn’t mean it has to be all at once.  Just about anything you do with a parrot around can be turned into an exciting mental and physical activity.

Skittles has a particular love for straws and medicine bottles (the child-safe ones you a pharmacy prescription in).  Any time I finish a soft drink, I was the cup out and let Skittles get to work on humorously destroying the evil straw.  I like to wash medicine bottles out and put seed in them and hand them off to him as well.  He loves to shake it around and hear everything rattling inside.  Secretly, he also is a big help when I need him to hold something so I can free up my hands!  Skittles also loves bottle caps, empty pill sheets (the ones you punch pills out of) and pens.  My mother even makes a game out of putting her make-up on by tickling him with her make-up brush!

You can also make games out of food.  Some birds want you to fetch food after they throw it, some like to play foraging games.  I like to hide food underneath a blanket on my lap and have Skittles try and find it.  Sometimes I just keep it balled in my fist and he’ll go to all lengths to pry that hand open!

Playing with your parrot should never be a chore.  It’s something you can do any time!  It also should be an enjoyable experience for the both of you!

Leaving Your Parrot at Home

Hopefully, this won’t be a particularly long post.  So this weekend I’ve been attending an anime convention (Japanese media and stuff).  That means that my beloved Skittles has not been with me since Thursday and will not see me until tomorrow (Monday).  As the typical obsessed parrot owner, I have worried over him and wondered how he’s getting along without me.  I’ve also wondered how he will react when I get home.  This is officially the longest I’ve ever spent away from him, after all.  So first off, how can I cope with missing my little (and loud) bundle of joy?  How do I feel secure in leaving him back in my home town?

Well first off, I’m going to get this out of the way.  I have a very awesome family that loves Skittles.  As such, they are more than willing to take care of him while I go off to lollygag during weekend conventions.  So I’m covered for now, but what about when I move out?  Certainly, I’m not going to dump my bird somewhere every time I want to go and take a vacation.  Well, one thing I’ve looked at (in my paranoia) is a place where I can safely store my bird when I’m away.  A place I know that he will be taken care of.  Who else will be better than a breeder?  I’ve found that there are plenty of breeders in my area willing to board parrots of all kinds.  This way, you know that your bird is not only being taken care of, but being taken care of by someone who probably knows just about everything you could possibly want them to know.  I’m not sure what the rates are though, but try calling around your local breeders.

Unless your family constantly handles your bird (like mine), you’re probably best to board him/her.  I would feel more secure paying someone who knows what they’re doing, rather than pay nothing for people who don’t know how to handle my parrot’s behavior.  And that’s my little nugget of wisdom for the day.

The Truth About Sexing Your Parrot

So I received a call the other day while volunteering at a clinic.  It was my vet office and they had news for me…the results are back.  Skittles is officially male!  So I decided I should talk about parrot sexing, the procedure, cost, and benefits.

If you’re like me, you didn’t get your bird from a breeder who would’ve already sexed their babies.  In fact, we didn’t really have a clear answer on how old Skittles was.  He was definitely a baby since his back was all green instead of yellow and he had that babyish look about him.  We assumed he was about four months old.  We also had no idea what gender he was at all.  The store didn’t know either.

Now you don’t have to sex all parrots.  Some are considered sexually dimorphic.  That basically means that they have consistent and visible characteristics for each sex.  Eclectus are the best example.  The females are bright red, while the males are green.  Even budgies are discernable by the blue color around the nose.  Males have blue, females have pink.  Many types of lories are distinguished by having larger heads for males.

These eclectus parrots are sexually dimorphic. The red one is female and the green one is male.

Now let’s assume that your bird is NOT sexually dimorphic.  Male, female, they all look the same to the untrained eye.  Some breeders can tell due to experience.  Aside from simply calling them whatever you want, there is really very little benefit from not getting your parrot sexed.  In fact, you probably won’t figure it out until the bird has since been aggressive and displayed behavior you don’t understand, including egg laying and nesting.  Knowing your bird’s sex can help you know what behavior to expect as your bird matures.  It will help you better understand what to do and why they are acting the way they are.

The best time to know your bird’s sex is before it reaches sexual maturity.  In most larger birds, that is at around 2 years of age.  However, on smaller birds, they can reach that stage in as little as a year.  When a bird reaches sexual maturity it is essentially going through the parrot version of “puberty.”  So just like a teenager, they’ll probably be rebellious, loud, and aggressive.  If it’s a female, expect nesting and possible egg laying.  Females have a tendency to be fantastic when they aren’t in breeding season, and more aggressive than males when they are.  That’s not to say it can’t be the other way around either.  Birds can get territorial and downright mean on bad days.  The most important thing is not to misunderstand the bird’s motives and give away the bird as a result.

So how exactly do you figure out your bird’s gender?  You don’t.  The vet does.  It requires a blood sample to be sent off to be tested, so there are no immediate results.  Before you cringe at the idea of a syringe taking blood from your sweet baby parrot, they don’t use a syringe.  You can actually couple this procedure with a routine nail trim.  Just like dogs and cats, bird’s a have a “quick” in their nail.  It’s an area full of blood inside the nail and is close to the non-vascular part of the nail that we usually cut.  The vet will clip a little bit into the quick and dab a piece of paper with the blood.  When the vet’s done, they’ll apply styptic powder to the tip of the nail to allow the blood to coagulate and to protect the wound from infection.  Done!

Generally, results don’t get back to you for 2-3 weeks.  The cost of this procedure where I went was $57.  This didn’t include the cost for wing and nail trim which was another $50 on its own.  Your bird might walk funny for a bit, but the wound heals very quickly and doesn’t bother them for long.

Behavior can help you guess your bird’s gender as well.  For example, while Skittles liked to cuddle, he also liked to be independent and play on his perch.  He wasn’t thrilled when I touched him tummy, which is where males are sexually stimulated.  These are all male characteristics, so we already had a good idea, but confirmation is always nice to have.

So to me, knowing the sex of a parrot is a good idea.  I like knowing what could be ahead so I can learn how to tackle the issues that arise before they happen.  Also, I feel weird not knowing whether to really call my bird a she or a he.  So save up a bit of extra money next time you go to the vet and get your parrot sexed!

I promise, I’ll make a better banner…really.

Hi there ho there,

I’d like to say this isn’t my first official post, but it is.  I feel the itch to put something other than the horrid default WordPress message.  The banner you see above was hastily thrown together to make my site look pretty.  I failed.  I also seemed to forget that there’s no border to my transparent banner and therefore I shouldn’t put giant eclectus heads that seem to cut off in a suspiciously straight line…

Anywho, this blog is mostly going to be about parrots and their care and news and so forth.  Also, it’s a place to chronicle the ever so interesting life of my own parrot, Skittles.  She/He is a Sun Conure and we are still waiting on test results to determine if his/her gender.  I’m just going to say he for my reader’s (as if I have any) sake.  He isn’t a hatchling anymore.  He’s actually around 1 year old.  We’ve gone this long not knowing his gender, but mom insists he’s a she and dad and I think that he’s a he.  In my own adventures with Skittles, I hope to provide pictures, nuggets of wisdom, tasty bird recipes, methods to address any behaviors I have actually encountered (because if I haven’t tried to do the methods the interwebz say, that would be silly), general facts about parrots in general, parrot news from around the globe, fun videos, etc.  See?  Parrot things.

Also, I don’t know if this is your cup of tea, but I’m into DIY (Do It Yourself) toy and perch making.  So basically, I want to be able to share what I find works and doesn’t work so you don’t have to waste time and money making the stupid mistakes like I do.

Now I’m not going to pretend I’m some parrot expert.  I’m not.  Heck, I haven’t even had Skittles for a full year yet.  Skittles is not the perfect, trained, well-adjusted parrot.  For example, he has a habit of pinching my neck with his beak, he flies off his perch if startled, he gets territorial when hormonal, if the dog barks, so does Skittles, I have yet to succeed in harness training him, and he has this odd and gross fascination with the innards of my nostrils and the um…”content” that are inside of said nostrils.  If you didn’t understand that, it means he likes to eat boogers.

Me as a parrot owner?  I have some bad habits as well.  I only clean Skittles’ cage out once a month.  I clean his perch once a week.  I give him lots of peanut butter and sometimes and teensy tiny bit of ice cream (no, not chocolate).  I have him around two cats and two dogs, although there’s only two that may hurt him, and one of them is simply very playful.  I sometimes go outside with no harness on my bird.  Probably the biggest habit is a potentially dangerous one.  So I plead with new bird owners not to do as I do.  In fact don’t even start.  It’s a bad idea.  I sleep with my bird.  I don’t mean his cage is close to my bed or that I have a little hideaway for him nearby.  I mean, that he sleeps with me in my bed.  His cage is in my parents’ room currently (my room is known for getting really hot and there’s nothing for Skittles to see there) and he will cry if I don’t take him with me to bed (parents need sleep you know).

He usually sleeps on my pillow and cuddles up against my face (best sensation ever) and moves down to my shoulder or chest later at night.  I feel for the bird every time I turn over to make sure I’m not squishing him.  I leave a large area of my sheets open so the bird can get out and get fresh air.  Despite all these precautions I cannot emphasize enough how dangerous it is.  This is a behavior that has been ingrained into him from before I knew better, and I’m trying to work on making it better.  However, the best way to address this behavior in other birds is to NEVER START.  There is potential to roll on top of your bird, suffocate him, even have him die from overheating.  It’s happened before.  It can happen to you.  Or me for that matter.  Don’t think I’m not making an effort to correct this.  I am.  However, some of the measures are time consuming, money consuming, or can only be done at certain times.  Basically, it’s taking awhile.

So long story short, I’m not perfect, I’m not a parrot expert (yet!) and I’m no veterinarian.  So if I say something completely off and strange?  Don’t assume it’s right because I said it.  Call me out on it.  Email me.  Even put it in the comments.  I like constructive criticism.  It helps me be a better parrot owner.  I think I have an email button, but if I don’t, my email is ihazaparrot@live.com.  Drop me a line.  Request something and maybe I’ll gather up enough info to fulfill your request.

Also, if I don’t post something for a good while, it’s not because I disappeared from the face of the earth.  While I may be able to post at work (for the moment), I won’t always have this job.  I also go to college.  So sometimes I may post sporadically throughout the month, or post really short tidbits to keep you updated.  Also, sometimes, if I’m frustrated, I’ll post non-parrot related rants and raves on my Tumblr account.  I probably have a button for that too but it’s http://conuredelsol.tumblr.com/

Anywho, I have to go fill out an about page or something.