Bird Health - Pet Bird Care

The New Pet Bird

Where to buy your pet bird?
Pets shops are very good places for you to buy budgerigars, canaries and peach faces. Whereas specialised bird shops are the best bet for hand reared pet birds. Above all, select a clean shop with healthy birds and a good reputation.

What are the best pet birds?
When hand reared, most Australian or overseas parrots make great pets, but some are more suitable than others. The larger parrots are more demanding than the smaller birds. They are also much noisier, but on the other hand, they are better talkers and make life long pets.

My favourite birds are quiet, intelligent and don’t bite.
The budgerigar, cockatiel, kakariki, princess parrot, regent, king parrot, grass parrot and smaller lorikeets make delightful pet birds, all capable of talking. You should visit the specialised bird shops and look at the variety and beauty of the many birds available as pets.

The Best Choices

Budgerigars
The budgie is the best bird for anyone over 6 years of age. They can be fantastic talkers and make life-long companions.

It is best to select:

A young weaned male budgie.
The most intelligent budgie in the cage. These are the most lively and inquisitive ones.
The bird with the best feathers. The young budgie must have a full tail and wings.

It is best to select a young weaned budgie as your pet because they tame more quickly to human kindness. You can tell a young budgie by the black horizontal bars which extend from the forehead to the beak. These bars are absent in the older budgerigar. Male budgies make the best pets but it is sometimes difficult to guarantee the sex of the very young budgie, especially if it is a lutino, albino or pied variety. Experienced bird shop staff should be able to pick a male for you. Select the most inquisitive budgie.

Budgerigars usually remain very healthy, but do require a regular health plan.

Cockatiels
After the budgerigar, I consider the cockatiel to be the best pet bird for youngsters. It has a very relaxed and friendly nature when hand reared and can learn to talk in no time at all. Again select a male, lively youngster. A bright orange cheek patch invariably indicates a male bird and there are differences in the tail pattern between males and females of grey but not white birds. Female cockatiels are unsuitable as pets because they are especially prone to excessive egg-laying activity and then egg binding.

The cockatiel takes a full two weeks to wean (eat independently). Take great care of a young cockatiel for a full three weeks after purchase to ensure it is eating.

The cockatiels are hardy birds, but do require a regular health plan.

The Lorikeets
The lorikeet is a playful and energetic bird and in its natural environment eats nectar and fruits rather than seeds. It requires a specialised diet of a nectar mix, fruit and vegetables. They are very untidy eaters and spoil the cage and its surrounds with their large, wet droppings. Their messy eating habits require a diligent owner to clean the cage every day to prevent bacterial and yeast (thrush) infections. The special cages and stainless steel food containers for lorikeets lessen the problems associated with their untidy eating habits. The smaller varieties of lorikeets (the varied and musk) are better pets because of their soft bite, but a well-trained rainbow or red-collared lorikeet are good talkers and a lot of fun.

The specialised foods need enriching with vitamins and minerals (NV powder is best). The cage and food containers must be disinfected regularly (Cage cleaner or Water Cleanser) to keep these larrikins healthy.

Princess, Regents, Superb and King Parrots make good pets
The Princess, Regent and King Parrots make superb pets and very good talkers, but they must be young male hand-reared birds when purchased. These parrots have a beautiful quiet bell like whistle, and rarely bite. When they do bite it is very feeble. The male princess parrot is my preferred hand reared pet bird. These parrots require regular worming (every eight weeks) as part of their health plan.

Kakariki
This delightful New Zealand parrot is the same size as a cockatiel, but has longer legs and the monkey-like personality of a lorikeet. I prefer this parrot to the cockatiel or lorikeet because it is has a soft call, is very clean and has a wonderful personality. However, it is more difficult to sex at a young age. Again it is vitally important to purchase a male young hand-reared bird. They do require regular worming as part of their health programme.

Neofemas
Contrary to popular belief the Bourke parrot makes a good pet, but it must be hand reared from an early age and be male. They are very quiet and available in a beautiful rose-pink colour.

Red Rump and Mulga Parrots
These are medium sized parrots with a soft call. Young hand reared males make delightful pets.

Mallee Ringneck and Port Lincoln Parrots are strikingly good looking birds that talk superbly.

These are larger energetic parrots that need a lot of space. They must be young hand-reared males when purchased for pets. Surgical or DNA sexing is required to determine the sex of the bird. Only specialised bird shops keep these beautiful birds. They need regular worming as part of their health programme.

Overseas Parrots
Of this group, the conures and Asiatic ringneck families make the best pets. They can be a little noisy and have hefty bite. The ring neck family rarely have health problems and make great talkers, but need worming each three months as part of their health programme.

The Larger Parrots and Cockatoos
The larger parrots (eclectus, african greys and macaws) and cockatoos (Corella, gang-gang, galahs, Major Mitchells and Sulfur crested cockatoos, black cockatoos) are highly intelligent and make the very best talkers but are birds for committed ownership. They have similar emotional needs to humans, requiring much more human companionship than the smaller parrots. The family with these larger birds must spend as much time with these extraordinary pet birds as they would with their pet dog. Time outside the cage is an integral part of the proper care of the larger pet birds and they must be touched and preened as part of their normal social behaviour. Your efforts in this area will be well rewarded. These parrots make delightful companions and live for a very long time (30 to 100 years).

They require a regular health plan and boredom relievers, developing feather-picking problems when deprived of attention or the correct diet. Research is needed through specialist bird publications available via Nigel and his staff at The Australian Bird Keeper Publications.

The Peach Face Parrot
This African bird is a character of the first degree and makes a very good pet, but it has a painful bite and rarely learns to talk. Most Peach Face parrots are hardy creatures but some get a disease called Megabacteria and others an incurable feather-picking syndrome. They are usually kept in pairs.

Starlings and Myna
These strange birds are not parrots but make the very best talkers, are quiet and do not bite. However, they require a very specialised diet to thrive.