Any parrot owners here?
 

I have a friend who has a Senegal parrot that's a lot of fun. This led me to volunteer at the New England Exotic Wildlife Sanctuary (fosterparrots.com), where they care for abused, abandoned and neglected parrots and a few other exotic animals. I'm learning a lot, and one thing becoming increasingly apparent to me is that NOBODY should own a parrot unless it is allowed to fly, or at least spend most of its time outside a cage and get plenty of interaction/exercise. Parrots are smarter than dogs, probably the smartest animal one can own. I encourage anyone who cares about birds and animals in general to donate to fosterparrots.com. That's my public service message for the day! :)

Re: Any parrot owners here?
 

My friend does. It used to run off with his dads reading glasses.

Re: Any parrot owners here?
 

I am owned by an orange wing :D

Too many people bring home a parrot not realizing what they're getting in to.

Re: Any parrot owners here?
 

I had an Indian Ringneck given to me about 20 years ago by a friend of a friend who was moving. It wasn't trained and bit about as hard as a Pitbull. I didn't keep him long.

Re: Any parrot owners here?
 

An all-too-common tragic story. Those are beautiful birds. It's not their fault that people are too stupid to care for them properly and own up to their responsibility.

Re: Any parrot owners here?
 

He was a beauty. Unfortunatly adult birds not knowing any social skills are much harder to train and I didn't have the time or know how to do this. My boys were 8 and 10 at the time and would have been great with a trained bird but the way he bit (even through lined winter gloves) made it impossible to keep him. Luckily I found a great home for him.

Re: Any parrot owners here?
 

Very glad to hear it.

Re: Any parrot owners here?
 

People used to bring my sister injured birds. She would splint their leg or wing ... care for it for a while with her secret potions fed though an eyedropper and then release them. Not sure why people stick big birds in cages ... kind of sad. We once had a Starling that had 2 broken wings that were not repairable. That bird would mimic every sound in the house. A door creaking, toilet flushing and swear words...funny as heck.

Re: Any parrot owners here?
 

How did you care for the starling and how long did it live? Any idea how its wings were broken?

Re: Any parrot owners here?
 

it got stuck in a picket fence ... that wing broke and I guess the other broke trying to get out. It lived for something like 8 years I believe. My sister had other birds that were supossed to talk and this bird talked way more than them ... his name was 'Merlin".

At first she fed them baby food from the jar ... then when back to heath the usual bird seeds, bird food and mealworms because they are smaller than earthworms. Most wild birds will not eat in captivity ... so that's where the eyedropper comes in ... you force feed them for a few weeks till they settle in.

When they were flapping strong in the cage she would let them go. She tried to let Merlin go but he could not fly. He actually came back to his cage ... almost like he knew he was safer in the cage.