South Sound Exotic Bird Society

Instinctual Needs Guide (produced by SSEBS)

Parrots are not domesticated creatures. There have not been enough generations of parrots in captivity for them to be considered domesticated companions in the same manner as dogs and cats. What that means for the humans who chose to share their lives with parrots is that the human must understand they are dealing with a wild creature who is two things – a prey animal and a flock animal. The mind set for living harmoniously with a parrot is completely different than for other companion non-humans who accept sharing their lives with we humans. We have the responsibility to provide the guidance necessary for the parrot to be successful in our living rooms as a human companion. Any action we take in building a relationship with a parrot must be based on trust. Parrots have no felt need to bend to our will – we must meet them at their need level to help them become all they can be as human companions.

The ground-breaking collaboration of Alex, the Congo African Grey, and Dr. Irene Pepperberg has shown once and for all that parrots are sensitive, intelligent, thinking, sentient beings. But there is a dichotomy. Parrots are instinctive creatures - creatures driven by instinct.

A parrot's first reaction to any challenge will be instinctive. The simple fact is that an animal that lives by his/her instincts is out of place in our world. Our best and most effective reactions to stimuli depend upon our ability to think logically and to reason out our difficulties. It is within this dichotomy of thinking that our misunderstandings with our parrots are born. We react to the events in our lives based upon the experiences we have and what we learn about being human beings. Our parrots react to the experiences in their lives based upon what they are taught by their parents about being a bird – if they even have had the benefit of being raised by their parents. The differences in the life experiences of humans and parrots create vast misunderstandings when we are attempting to interpret the behavior of our companion parrots. Our tendency is to use our knowledge of our own way of responding as the basis upon which to interpret our parrot’s behavior because it is the tool with which we are familiar. Avian behaviorist Pam Clark has identified a good example of this phenomenon related to diet. We provide a new, nutritious food choice. The parrot instinctively is suspicious of anything new and won't touch it, even when it is provided over a period of days. Most frequently, the parrot owner concludes that his bird "doesn't like" that food. The more accurate and appropriate conclusion would be to assume that, because of his/her instinctive nature and life experiences, the parrot needs more time to get used to the new food and that it should be offered over an indefinite time period. The parrot may not recognize the item as something to eat. We can help make that connection by eating it in front of the parrot and explaining how good what we are offering is to eat. The responsibility we have in this example is to educate ourselves about appropriate parrot diets to ensure that we are, in fact, offering something that is good for our feathered friend.

There are some “hard-wired” behaviors we can discuss as instinctive. The ones we will mention here are security, foraging and chewing.

Security

One important skill a bird needs in the human world is the ability to accept change. By being flexible and viewing change as no big deal, your parrot will be able to deal with commonly encountered experiences in life in our household with grace, good humor and minimal stress. The sooner you introduce your bird to changes in life in a non-threatening way (new toys, new people, moving to another home, family outings and vacations, changes in diet, additions to the family – human and non-human - to name a few) the less likely your parrot will be threatened by such things.

Foraging and Chewing

Studies of wild parrots have revealed that they spend about 80% of their day foraging for food. Little of his/her time is spent in actual eating. Most of the time is spent looking for the food. In captivity, parrots have their food served to them in bowls and don’t need to spend their time foraging – or do they? As a companion parrot, they usually don’t have to do anything other than get to the food dish – then they spend the rest of the time looking for something to do. It’s called boredom. Every parrot should have a job. Not to pay for their room and board, but to keep them busy. Foraging is a great way to stimulate the parrot’s mind and also encourage movement and exercise. Foraging must be taught to most of our companion birds and advanced foragers take months to develop and not days. One method of teaching your parrot to forage involves making a series of changes to the cage and/or freestanding tree or play area involves the following steps:

Keep using the bowl in which the bird was typically fed, but don’t fill it to

overflowing, put in just enough food for the day. Don’t put the most favored treats

in the bowl.

2. Add several smaller foraging bowls all over the cage. Place these small bowls in the

cage in a way that makes the bird fully traverse the cage to get to all the bowls.

Now place only a very small amount of a favorite treat in each of these bowls. We

want to encourage the bird to move and explore all the bowls, not get its entire

ration from the first bowl h/she finds.

When the bird has mastered finding treats in all the little bowls, begin to add a small

piece of paper on top of each bowl so that the bird must push it off to get to the

treat. Advance from here to securing the paper safely on the bowl so the parrot

must chew through the paper to get the contents of the bowl.

Purchase some retail foraging bowls with lids that can be placed on tightly so that

the bird must work out how to undo the lid to get the treat as well as other

foraging toys. The idea is that as the bird masters each stage the foraging is

made a little more physically and mentally demanding. Many excellent foraging type

toys can be purchased from retail stores and toys can also be easily and

inexpensively made at home.

When your bird has become a master forager you can start varying the routine.

Place a variety of foraging toys in the cage. Some of the bowls are now empty,

some are filled with actual toys, and some are filled with small treats. You can also

introduce some of the acrylic type toys that require an action such as opening a

drawer, turning a wheel, or lifting a lid to get to the treat. Rotate the toys

frequently to prevent the parrot from getting into a “rut” about how to work the

foraging system in his/her cage.

One of the most important parts of the parrot’s anatomy involved in foraging is its beak – h/she must be able to keep their beak fit to survive. Nature’s way of keeping a parrot’s beak and jaw fit and trim is chewing. Just like our fingernails, a bird’s beak is continually growing. A parrot depends on its beak for eating, nest building, feeding chicks, preening, climbing, gripping, defense against other parrots and predators. So it is critical that you provide opportunities for your parrot to chew – but on appropriate, safe things. If you don’t provide supervision, the need to chew can cause problems for you – destruction of your household (furniture, woodwork) - and place your bird in extreme danger (toxic plants, electrical cords, flaking paint chewed off metals, coming into contact with household cleaners). You cannot stop your parrot’s need to chew, but you can channel this instinct to appropriate objects – examples include non-toxic branches from bird safe trees, toys designed for destruction by chewing, cuttlebone, foraging toys, hard shelled nuts (be certain they are fresh – nuts are a source of bacterial contamination - and pesticide free).

Links to useful websites:

Avian Enrichment - Social

Avian Enrichment - Mental

Avian Enrichment - Independence

The True Parrot - Social Needs

The True Parrot - Boredom

Toys for Mental Health

Behavioral Enrichment For Parrots