Your best chance at a healthy and successful diet for your parrot is in the variety of foods you put in her bowl. By rotating the different foods available in the different food groups such as vegetables, fruits and grains, you increase the chances of hitting upon just the right combination, at the right time, for your individual bird.
In the wild, some birds will dine on the same food source for weeks until it is used up, or gone out of season. They then move on to another food. In our homes, birds don’t have the luxury of choice. They get what we serve, and may not always be what they need at that time.

Every species has different requirements for their diet. A macaw needs a diet that is lower in protein and higher in fat than a cockatoo who requires the opposite. Amazons need abundant vitamin A, african greys need calcium, and so on. Even this is a generalization. Within the macaw family, for instance, the hyacinth needs an even higher fat percentage than the average blue and gold. To further complicate things, each individual bird has nutritional needs unique only to them.
This creates a lot of challenges for parrot owners. Since we aren’t able to determine the exact set of needs in a particular bird, and since you will never hear your bird say “Polly want a vitamin D3 supplement”, there’s a lot of guess work involved. The best way to cover all the bases is to offer a bit of everything. Your bird knows what she needs. When she goes through a picky phase, she may be telling you that she needs a change in her diet.

Try stepping outside your comfort zone by trying veggies that you are unfamiliar with. I had no idea what bok choy or kohlrabi was before I had parrots. Throw in the left over parsley. Serve whole carrots and beets with the tops attached. Give a piece of whole grain toast for breakfast, or with peanut butter later in the day for a snack. Has your bird ever tried a parsnip? Mine love them. Try to change the menu as often as possible and include as many foods from as many groups as you can.Your bird will have a healthier diet and be more willing to try new foods in the future.

Consumers have fought a won a small battle with the manufacturers of the products we buy.  We have demanded that products be safe for the environment and safe for us in our homes.  In today’s market, there are a variety of products labeled as “green”. But what does “green” mean exactly? The color green suggests a healthy environment.  A “green” product claims to be ecologically responsible. Green is also the color of money, which is exactly what retailers make using this term.

Regardless, it’s a step forward.  It is now possible to contact a manufacturer about ingredients and processes used to make their products and get an actual answer instead of dead air, followed by “I don’t know”. They understand, and are willing to address our concerns. However, don’t expect anytime soon to see big warning signs telling us that “this product may be hazardous to your future health and might kill your parrots”.  We have to be smart enough to educate ourselves.

Who would think to wonder if something as seemingly harmless as a hairdryer might pollute the air with toxins?  Or the toaster oven?  The new stove?  I know.  It makes you begin to wonder if anything you own is actually safe.
The one thing these products have in common is that they produce heat. Appliances that get hot are sometimes coated with a non-stick teflon surface. Heated teflon surfaces throw dangerous chemical gases into the air called PTFEs (polytetrafluoroethylene). These odorless gases can kill a bird in minutes.  It’s not just cookware coated with this surface that are the enemy.

Photo by top-10-list.org

When buying new appliances, the internal surfaces need to be a serious consideration to parrot owners.  Be sure you contact the manufacturer before you purchase to ask questions and state concerns.  Be certain to ask if there are any non-stick coated surfaces, and will this outgas PTFEs?
Regardless of the answer you receive, take certain safeguards anyways. After you install your new stove, open your windows and doors and take any living things away from the house: your family, your birds and your other pets (feel free to leave the ants behind). Turn all burners on the new stove to high, and turn the oven on to the highest temperature (with the door shut) and leave them running for at least 30 minutes. This will burn off any residues on the burners and inside surfaces from cleaning chemicals or other substances coating them.  Be sure the air is clean before you bring the birds back in.  Because of their dynamic respiratory system, a bird will fall victim to toxic air far quicker that a mammal.
****In case you don’t know this, you should never use the self-cleaning feature on your oven for these same reasons. Self cleaning oven produce such high temperatures that outgasing is a serious concern.

Q: My friend says that I shouldn’t get a mirror for my cockatiel because he will become infatuated with the “bird in the mirror” and want nothing to do with me.  Is this true?
Sharon M., Waterford, WI

A:  In a word, no. Cockatiels do love their own reflections and will spend a lot of  time staring at and singing to “the bird in the mirror”. Mine do, and I have never experienced my relationship suffering with any of my birds because of mirrors.

It is a bit difficult to understand a bird’s relationship to its reflection. There is really nothing in nature, besides water, that is so highly reflective that a bird could see itself. It would have to be a very still day for a bird to be able to recognize its reflection in a pond, and I have never read that anyone has observed this behavior in a wild bird. So why are so many enamored with their reflections in captivity?

It has been the subject of scientific study whether a bird recognizes the image in the mirror as itself.  Scientists believe that dolphins do recognize themselves and suspect that birds do as well. I know my umbrella cockatoo, Linus, recognizes his own reflection simply by the fact that he doesn’t try to attack it. However, my quaker gets aggressive when anything refective goes into his cage, including stainless steel bowls. Theo, my goffins cockatoo, sleeps cuddles up next to her stainless steel mirror, and lately I have watched her holding a corner in her foot and manipulating the image behind her. Very clever.

We may never have the answers to the questions this topic brings to mind. The bottom line is that if it makes your bird happy and there are no unwanted behaviors resulting from it, there’s no reason to disallow this form of entertainment.

Be very sure to select mirrors that are appropriate for your bird’s size. For the small birds, budgies and cockatiels, try Hall Of Mirrors. It’s a three sided mirror that gives multi images and is safe for their bite pressure.  My cockatiels love it so much I had to order another so they each had their own.  For any bird larger, conures on up to macaws, only use stainless steel mirrors for safety reasons.  NEVER use glass of any kind in your bird’s cage.  This includes hand-held and compact mirrors.

I try to buy all of my fruits and veggies organically, but the produce here in Orlando is horrible.  I have never seen such a poor selection of withered and wilted food anywhere I have lived before.  I’ll be in the organic area of the supermarket and often walk over to purchase the regular produce just because it’s fresher, a little. I sometimes resort to the frozen food section out of necessity.

Even though they are inconveniently located for me, I had hopes that Whole Foods would save the day, but they also sell fresh foods that are just days away from being garbage.  I have had to get comfortable with buying regular produce, and try to deal with the fact that it’s obviously quite past its peak.

I found this government list recently that tells you which foods should definitely be bought organically and those which we can feel safe about purchasing non-organically and why.  Rather than repeat the information, I have just included this link.  Don’t forget to go to page 2 for the list of clean vegetables:  12 dirtiest vegetables. I was kind of surprised not to see green beans on the dirty list.

Q:  I was forced to board my parrot at the vet for two weeks when I had to fly out of town because my mother become ill.  Now my bird wants nothing to do with me, and has actually bitten me twice, which is not like her at all. What can I do to fix our relationship?

A:  One of the first things I teach my birds is an understanding of the words “I’m sorry”.  Accidents happen, toes get closed in cage doors, beaks get bonked with elbows. When I issue a heartfelt apology, all is forgiven. Sometimes, though, we commit such a sin in the eyes of our parrots that all the “I’m sorry”s, special treats and extra scritches in the world won’t make a difference. Usually, these things are done inadvertently by us, or out of necessity, as in your case.  Sometimes we have no clue that we did anything wrong at all.
Try to understand that you are you bird’s best friend, in some cases, only friend.  They look to you for their daily care and companionship. Imagine what it must seem like to your bird to be suddenly dumped in a strange place. Looking at this from a bird’s perspective, it’s a little unreasonable for us to expect that all of them will just accept what must seem like abuse.
Different birds handle their anger in different ways.  Some will turn their backs on you, which is a bird’s way of refusing to acknowledge your presence, some will take favor in a different person, some will bite.
If you had found out that your best friend had stolen money from you, you’d feel angry and betrayed, right?  Isn’t your hurt magnified by the fact that this was your best friend whom you trusted implicitly? If we lived in a society that accepted biting as reasonable retaliation in these circumstances, as birds do, wouldn’t you take a chunk out of your friend’s arm?  I would.

Since we can’t explain our misdeeds to a parrot, there is one way, and one way only, to fix this problem: by earning back the trust of your parrot through your actions. It’s not as hard as it might sound. You have already done this once when you first brought her home.

STARTING OVER

Take your relationship with your bird to the beginning, right back to the very first day you brought her home, and start over. When you’re done reading this post, write an outline of your first day with your bird way back when. Begin with a paragraph about how you felt.  Were you excited?  What were your hopes for this new relationship?  Were you looking for a constant companion for you or existing bird? What were your expectations?  Did you hope she would talk, learn tricks, accompany you on outings?
Write another paragraph about how the bird reacted to coming to your home?  Was she frightened?  Standoff-ish?  Was she a little slow to accept new things?
Finally make a list of all the special considerations you made to ensure her comfort. Did you speak more softly? Keep the household calm and quiet at first? Move more slowly around her to keep from frightening her?  Make sure she got lots of sleep?
Since you had created a great relationship with your bird, you have to assume you did things to her liking the first time around. Do it again.

It’s pretty simple isn’t it?  This time you even have the advantage of not being a total stranger. Usually the bird will come around pretty quickly, if you put in the effort. As things become familiar and comfortable again, she will begin the let go of her grudges.
I will say, though, that the more clever birds know when you are “sucking up” and will use it to their advantage. This is one area of a bird’s intelligence that we continually under-estimate. You will want to recognize signs of this and know where to draw the line. You are not trying to buy her love by spoiling her.  You are simply re-establishing what you once had. There’s a big difference.
Take a look at the paragraph you wrote about your expectations with this bird. Did you accomplish them?  If not, this is a second chance to change any bad habits or start training the new behaviors and tricks you had once imagined.

Photo by www. picturesofcats.org

Bird lovers tend to be animal lovers in general, so it makes sense that we would have other pets.  However, dogs and cats, as well as other animals, can pose a great threat to your parrot.
Many or my pets have grown up in the company of birds. In several cases, the birds were there first and the cats entered a household that was already geared towards birds.  This helped to set the stage for what was expected of my cats, but in no way alleviated any dangers.  A cat is a cat, and even those accustomed to birds will act on instinct sometimes.
I regret that I have woken up on two separate occasions to find “presents” from my cats beside me in bed. One was a mouse, the other a sparrow.  Both were quite dead. The same cat that brought me the sparrow would show no interest in the family birds, but after he gifted me that morning, I knew that those instincts were there. It was a strange situation. The cockatiels would land on top of him while he was sleeping and he would barely open an eye in response. The worst thing he would ever do to them was stand on their tails as they walking past. I knew, however, that the cat was a capable birder and kept on guard whenever they were together. (The cat was terrified of Linus, my umbrella cockatoo, who would chase him all over the house, often catching him.  There is a sparrow in heaven who is smiling at this fact.)

Photo by www.picturesofcats.org

Several years ago, Linus became ill with a highly contagious disease.  Because he and Theo, my goffins cockatoo, were housed in the same room, I sent her to live with a nearby friend for a couple of weeks. I was horrified when he sent me a picture of little Theo asleep cuddled up to his great dane. There are times when the two most unlikely animals can become the best of friends.  But it is risky.
Mammals, ourselves included, carry gram negative bacteria in our mouths. It can be deadly to a bird, who doesn’t carry that type of bacteria in its body.  Claws can also have this and other bacterias present. Should your bird be bitten or scratched by any mammal, an urgent trip to the vet is necessary, even if it appears minor. We should not let our birds have contact with other pet’s toys for this same reason.
Sometimes an injury inflicted by your pet may not even be visible. Injuries or broken bones my occur without leaving a mark of evidence. Blood is not always present. Linus squeezed several parakeets to death in a former home and the only evidence of trauma to the birds was that they were dead.  This is yet another good reason to keep large and small birds separated when not supervised.

Photo of bird dog by www.lolcats.com

Cats traditionally are bird hunters. With domestic cats, often it is not done out of hunger, but in the fulfillment of an instinctual need, or sometimes just for fun.  There are breeds of dogs (such as retrievers, spaniels, and pointers) that have been bred as birders and the instinct to hunt birds is very strong in them even if it is not utilized.  It is literally impossible for us to say we fully know our pets. While it might be true that certain behaviors are or are not likely in an individual animal, we do not share their instincts and cannot fully understand them. Always be careful, and very watchful should your pets share a common play area.