Parrot Recipes - healthy simple recipes for your parrot: macaw, conure, cockatoo, eclectus, quaker, amazon, african grey, cockatiel, budgie, or parakeet
| Captive Foraging | Parrot Chow | Parrot Lovers |

Captive Foraging for Parrots

Captive Foraging for Parrots - LiveJournal.com

Bird-Safe Thread?

I'd like to string some raisins, popcorn and dried cranberries to hang in Banjo's cage as a foraging toy, and was wondering how best to do that safely. And advice would be appreciated!  more...

My first attempt at captive foraging creation :)

I wanted to make a fun foraging toy for my recently inherited cockatiels, but i'm broke. haha. So i looked in my recycling bin and craft room and came up with something ugly but works! :)



x-posted to craftyrecycling and captiveforaging  :)

   more...

Squawk Store closing

The wonderful Squawk Store is closing, and everything in stock (not including items shipped directly from the manufacturer) is 25% off. If you order over $100 of merchandise, shipping is free. This place has the BEST selection of foraging toys I've ever seen, plus lots of other really great stuff. Get it while you can!


This summer The Squawk Store is closing its doors for good. As a small family business, we can only run smoothly as our family does. Due to a divorce, we are having serious life changes that do not allow for this project's continuation. We are sad that we cannot continue being a part of your lives in this way,
but Squawk and Howl Pet Sitting will continue serving the parrots of the greater Bay Area.

Our loss is your gain as we place our inventory on sale. All items that are stocked in our store (not manufacturer delivered drop-ship items) are on sale as we clear out our warehouse. Currently, these items are 25% off! Wanting that expensive gym or toy but didn't wanna plunk down so much green? Now is your chance!

Note: If you by chance order an item that we run out of, you will be promptly refunded for that item, as we are not creating backorders.

And! Spend $100 or more and get free shipping by entering the code "firesale" in the discount code box and all shipping fees will be taken off in the final stages of checkout. (Be sure to enter this code in the discount code/coupon box, not the comments box to receive your discount.)

And speaking of the comments box, thanks to all of you for saying lovely things to me in this time of transition and great confusion. I am deeply grateful to my wonderful customers.

Thanks again for being a part of the Squawk Flock!

x-posted.  more...

Foraging Idea- Seeds in a Wiffle Ball

I've found that grey striped sunflower seeds fit perfectly into a large wiffle ball... slide in pretty easy but are hard to get out. I stuffed a bunch into a wiffle ball and Tara is going nuts. I got my seeds at Parrot Island, they are cheap and organic.

http://parrotisland.mainsecureserver.com/catalog/product_info.php?cPath=85&products_id=462  more...

More foraging with Static

One problem I noticed with this toy is that I highly doubt Static's ability to open it when it's free-swinging. I suspect that just adds far too much difficulty. Luckily, it has some little dood-dads on the bottom that make it so you can stand this toy up on the bottom of the cage, on the cage grate. Which is what I will do for now. Maybe in a few weeks when she's more used to the toy I'll try hanging it and see if she can master that.

This is another one of those Nature's Instincts/Foragewise toys.

Edit: Okay, it doesn't stand up so great on the bottom of the. Cage we're experimenting to try to get it to work.  more...

Foraging Nuts

With two flighted caiques, sometimes I just need a way to get them to settle down and be quiet for a few minutes! I've come up with a nifty trick to do just that: Give them a nut.

I buy bulk mixed nuts in the shell, then use a flat-head screwdriver and a hammer to punch a small hole in the shell of each walnut, Brazil nut, pecan, and hazelnut. (The almonds they can open by themselves!)

When I need to occupy the birds for a while, I'll pull out a nut for each of them, call them over, and give them the nuts. Walnuts only take about 5 minutes for them to crack open and pull out, but a Brazil nut can keep them occupied for a long time!

(The usual disclaimer applies: nuts are a high-fat food, so they should be given sparingly, particularly to small birds.)  more...

Foraging with Cockatiels

I know some people have trouble finding foraging toys for their smaller birds. There are more toys out there that work than you think! I got one recently that's working out pretty well, with a little modification.



Note: seeds are not a common food item in this house. I used them this time to encourage the birds to explore the toy, which they saw for the first time today. I'll probably fill this one with veggies and/or sprouts (since it's so easily washed), or their usual pellet and dry foraging mix most of the time.

Further ideas for modifying this toy: Since one row of balsa is so easy to break through, two rows is a better idea. Leafy greens, paper, or shredders can be woven through the balsa. The inside could be stuffed with shredded paper mixed with treats, to make finding the goodies even more difficult.

(Crossposted to captiveforaging, parrot_lovers and cockatiels)  more...

Barrel of Fun

This weekend while traveling I stopped by Parrots and Company (in Connecticut) and picked up a whole bunch of new foraging toys for my two caiques.

So far the only one I've tried out on my birds is the Barrel of Fun, made by Nature's Instinct. It's a durable, well-made, inexpensive toy (although not suited for bigger birds). My guys are pretty good at other manipulation toys, so they figured this one out very quickly. Still, it's a good toy to swap into their cage and occasionally fill with a treat to keep them guessing.



I'd recommend this toy for small to medium-sized foragers who are good at basic foraging (chewing through paper, looking inside things for treats, etc) and are ready to move to the next level, or for mid-level foragers for whom manipulating things is still a bit of a challenge.  more...

Paper Masher

Hey guys,
Do you think (or has anyone) made a foraging toy out of paper masher? I was thinking about why it wouldn't be such a good idea and decided just to ask here. The newspaper (providing it's black and white) won't hurt them and I don't think the floury water mix would hurt them either. And you can make all sorts of variations of shapes pretty easily. I also thought since you can put many layers to make it stronger, it would probably work well for many types of parrots and foraging levels alike. The only thing I would be careful with is making sure every layer is completely dry, or it may be a question of mouldy paper.  Any thoughts?
TIA :o)  more...

Parrot Enrichment Activity Book v2.0

The new version of the Parrot Enrichment Activity Book is now out! (It's in PDF format)

This book is a great collection of articles and resources for parrot owners, covering topics such as enrichment, foraging, toy making, and training. It also features photos and ideas from several members of this community and parrot_lovers. :)

Download and enjoy!

(x-posted to captiveforaging and parrot_lovers)  more...
Hi everyone! I'm new here :) I recently got a new parrot and have decided to start him/her out right away with the captive foraging. Daiquiri is a Major Mitchell's Cockatoo. I'm sure I'll be asking advice pretty often, but I also hope to contrtibute some ideas!

Daiquiri is only 14 weeks old, and is also in the process of converting from seed to pellet. The only captive foraging we've done so far has worked pretty well! I used a cardboard tube from the inside of a cash register reciept roll and showed him/her that I put a peanut inside it. He's spent a couple of days shredding into it (I give it to him when he has time ouside of the cage)and has only just made enough of a hole it get to the peanut. To be honest s/he seemed more interested in chomping up the tube than in the peanut, but it's still fun!

I'm sure I'll get many more ideas from all you parronts out there :)  more...


I have two peachface lovebirds: Akira, a slate hen, and Caspian, a dutch blue cock.



This is their new inside cage, because the room their other cage is in has been co-opted for the air conditioner over summer, and their usual cage doesn't fit upstairs.

This is just a hexagonal biscuit tin:



It's mostly full of "Breeders Choice" kitty litter, which is recycled paper compressed into pellet form (my avian vet specifically recommended it ;3), with some wood shavings. Sprinkled through it is two different sorts of pellets (Roudybush and Passwells), and a little bit of their seed mix, which has dried fruit and nut shavings as well as seed. There's a couple of kitty balls inside and a paper plate on top to make it a bit harder for her.



This is Akira scuttling down to sit in the door and tell me off for putting a camera inside her cage ;D



And the two of them sitting cutely on their cholla branch.



This is a bird bath, which I've been using for a while as a foraging station -this one has a base of pellets, with a little bit of kitty litter, some wood shavings, some torn up paper, and a kitty ball.

I also make up these:




I put it in the biscuit tin so it wouldn't just end up through the bars. I usually make up a few with a mixture of seed and pellets (and occasionally one with just litter or wood shavings) and tie them around the cage with twine, but I'm out of twine, so just the one in their bucket today. :)

In the background of that shot as well you can see their huge rope perch, which I've folded into a sort of sideways boing; once I've got some raffia, I'll be tying treats inside of there as well. ;)

I don't have any of the spiffy foraging toys around the place, but there's enough between those two, their little wooden bucket (soaking at the moment) and the paper packets to feed them for two or three days. Later this afternoon I'll probably put their normal food bowl back in as well, but it doesn't get much attention until everything else is exhausted. ;)

Downstairs, where their big cage usually is and my computer lives, we've got horrible cheap carpetting as well as their playpens. So before I bring them down to hang around with my partner and I, a handful of budgie seed gets scattered about the room, so they spend a couple of hours running around on the carpet looking for food.

Caspian doesn't get into it much, since Akira's a huge bully and chases him off, which is why I leave the normal food bowl in xD I worry sometimes that he'll starve to death, the way she is about her food bowl.  more...

Research on captive foraging

ltdead posted a link to this article in parrot_lovers, but it was buried in a comment thread. It is really interesting, so I wanted to re-post it here.

A More Beautiful Life: Research proves that toys, attention, and avian pals can change your bird's behavior for the better  more...

I have really pretty birds.

I'm about halfway settled into the new house so I figured there were no more excuses to be lazy about feeding the birds. I'm getting back into the fulltime foraging routine very slowly, but surely.



Frankie is gorgeous and he knows it. (His flights are growing back and I'm on the fence about what to do on that front.)




I got three of these little baskets for $1.00 at my best friend, the Family Dollar. My other best friends (sisal rope and newspaper) turn it into a great foraging toy for birds that aren't quite skilled foragers yet.




They're easy to clean, so these work well with mushy food.




Poe won't forage very high up, she's still a pretty clumsy parrot. So, I tied the basket to a perch so that she could reach it but would still have to do some manipulating to actually get the food.



I did similar to the budgies but just put their basket on the floor. Mostly, because the larger holes in the basket made me a little nervous. For that reason, I wouldn't recommend this one for the tiny birds unless you're all about watching like a hawk. The holes look big enough for budgie heads to fit in and that was my primary concern. (Having to watch things closely is also a great excuse to take lots of pictures.)




Paine is so incredibly pretty.




Pixel, Peregrin, and Phizzy dig in. Pika stands guard.




Normally he'd be right down there with them making sure he got his share. This time, I think he's letting them do all the work first.




Of course, they'll eat around the paper rather than destroy it but that's ok.




Pixel is forever bathing in food.




It's a squishy bath.




And she has to make sure she gets every inch squished.




Meanwhile, Arctic and Crystal fling food on walls.




Phidget is food-covered.




Pico is hot.




Every time I look at Phidget's little pudgey face I want to SQUEE.




See what I mean??? Her face is ALWAYS some degree of floofy. *dies*




She and Pico are best pals. Phidget's beak is eons better than it used to be as well! I thought she was going to require constant trims for a while there but that isn't the case. :)




Forever-baby is getting sleepy. :) I'm so glad I ended up with these two.



Pixel rivals the cuteness of Phidget's babyface with wet birdness.




They really like their new window.




Phizzy keeps an eye out for something extreme to happen.




Nothing extreme about Pixel falling asleep, sorry!




Peregrin joins her.




He looks quite chuffed.




And omg, cute.




Phizzy remedies the boredom with some extreme perching.




She's much more comfortable now that something cool has happened.




Pika poses while Paine gazes outside.




I was running out of time so cut up a paper plate for Frankie's foraging fun.




Cat feet are not allowed to forage.




"AHHH GET AWAY FROM MY NEW TOY WHICH IS PROBABLY FILLED WITH SOMETHING EDIBLE."




"AWAY WITH YOU!"




*attack*




I had to take the newspaper off the top of Poe's before she'd dig in. :P I am seriously thinking she just sits around and waits until I make things easier on her. But with soft food, there isn't much else I can do as I don't want it to spoil before she decides to go for it. Oh well! She still had to do a little work. :D

x-posted from eterri  more...

All day foraging?

My two caiques usually stay at home all day while I'm at work, so I use foraging to help keep them entertained and occupied.

However, they're such good foragers that they buzz through foraging enrichments pretty fast. Lately I've been trying to think up ways to make their foraging last longer.

One thing I've done is divided their food among several different foraging toys - e.g. a hanging skewer, a carousel, and a hanging coffee filter bundle. I also wrap dry food/treats in newspaper and stuff those into nooks and crannies in their toys.

That's worked pretty well, but I am scouting for more ideas, preferably more challenging ones. They're not big wood chewers, so those wooden "treat cages" for them to chew through don't work. They'll gnaw on balsa and other soft woods, but haven't really learned to chew and chew and chew it yet.

One good challenge is to put a small (but not teeny-tiny) ceramic flowerpot on their hanging skewer, put some food in it, and then skewer some slices of root veggies on top as a "lid." They have to chew through the hard veggies to get to the good stuff. It's much harder still if I thread the flowerpot upside-down over their fruits and veggies, or over a smaller container holding their main diet. Another good challenge might be threading two same-sized flowerpots so that the openings faced each other, with food in between. The bird would have to slide the top pot up to get at the food.

Does anyone have any other ideas for more challenging enrichments for experienced foragers?  more...

basil flowers

This week I took my caiques to the farm through which I get my CSA to do some u-picking. When picking basil, I discovered that they really love holding the flowery tops of the plants and eating off all of the flowers and buds. This might just be because caiques are flower-eaters in the wild, but it's a quick and easy natural foraging toy, so I figured I'd share it with you all. (Plus it makes their breath smell nice!)

So far my birds have been ignoring the sunflowers I've put in their cage, but they do love pulling all of the kernels off of dried ears of corn (I get them as popcorn through my CSA). It ranks right up there on the fun-o-meter with pulling all of the foot toys out of the foot toy bowl and tossing them on the floor, one by one. ;)  more...

Paper Cup Forager

I just made one of these for Lucy and one for the lovies. It's basially three paper cup thingies strung on a piece of rafia separated by beads. Then I put some Harrison's pellets and a few seeds in the cups:

Nai-Nai and Leyla are naturals:)

 

  more...

Foraging feather picker

Just wanted to introduce myself (hi) and mention that I was very pleased to find this group.  I have a number of birds, including a Congo African Grey, a yellow-collared macaw, a Hahn's macaw, two budgies, and six Gouldian finches.  (And the chickens would be insulted if I didn't mention them; however, they don't live in the house with me.)

My three bigger parrots have all been with me since weaning, and they are about ten years old each.  I  have never had a problem with feather picking, except that my YCM has a beak issue that doesn't allow him to preen correctly, so he has a tendency to snip feathers off as opposed to running them through his beak.  As a result, my Hahn's typically looked pretty ratty, because my YCM grooms him.

When I moved from southern California to northern California, in 2003, however, my Hahn's started feather plucking about six months after we moved in.  I am not sure what caused him to start, as we have moved before (three times) with no ill effects, and he has never had a tendency to pluck.  I suspect part of the reason was that he is no longer in the main part of the house, so he gets less attention from humans, and the main source of lighting is full-spectrum, rather than natural daylight.  I have all the birds on the first floor (the only part of the house that I can keep cool in the summer and that isn't carpeted), but the room they are in is a converted garage, so other than a pair of French doors, there are no windows.  I have read, since starting to research his plucking, that artificial lighting can be a culprit.

After trying some other fixes, with negative results, I started experimenting with setting up foraging stations, and eventually ran into this group, which has been great.  Fingers crossed, but as of this morning, my Hahn's has little pin feathers all over his chest and the tops of his wings (where he was formerly Butterball bare).  I keep walking in holding my breath, expecting to see him plucked again, but have been pleasantly proven wrong thus far!

Any advice as to how to help a bird who is missing his upper beak (my YCM) forage would be greatly appreciated.  All the foraging toys are meant for birds who can "hook" things out of holes, or who can tear up paper and wood, and he can't do any of these things.  He can tear up wet paper towels, but that is about the limit of his ability.  more...

Water foraging?

Recently, instead of giving my CAG water in her water dish, I've been using a newly-bought small litter box on the bottom of the cage (her cage is large enough for this without getting feces in it from her perching above). There are two reasons for this:

1) I've wanted to see if it would increase her foraging activities, especially when eating pellets as she now has to take them down to the litter pan to dunk them (note: I am not trying to stop the dunking as that seems very cruel to do to an animal that does not produce saliva when eating dry food)

2) I wanted her to have a larger container to attempt to take baths in. She has always hated bathing and it isn't even force-able as she'll keep her feathers flat and moisture never fully penetrates. She tries to take baths in her water dish all the time but with little success because of the size. I hope she'll become comfortable enough with the litter box to try to bathe in it.

So far it's been working pretty decently from the water and pellet aspect. As far as I am aware she has not tried to bathe in it. I was also considering getting another box to allow her to dig for food as I've seen her using her feet to dig in her food dish... but what to have her dig through?

Has anyone else tried either of these before?

Also, for cockatiels what would anyone here suggest as good starter reusable foraging toys?  more...

Veggie foraging pictures

I finally uploaded pictures of some of the veggies-as-food-dishes that I've been making. Here they are:

Green pepper foraging dish:
Before:


After:




Purple pepper foraging toy, with caique:


Zucchini foraging toy:
For this one I hollowed out a chunk of a zucchini, filled the cavity with food, then closed it with a zucchini-slice lid held on with two wooden skewers. I speared it sideways onto their hanging skewer. I use this same method for cucumbers and yellow squash.
Before:




After:





  more...

Cornstalk!

Today when I did my weekly cage cleaning and rearranging, I decided to try a new foraging enrichment.

My upstairs neighbors have a garden in our front yard, and I found a small ear of corn whose stalk had broken. I finished breaking it off and wedged the stalk in a corner of the birds' cage.

Sure enough, they've already been chewing on the stalk and have chewed away some of the husk to reveal part of the corn cob! They seem to like it, and it gives their cage a bit of a "jungle-y" feel, with the big corn leaf sticking out.

I'll definitely be pulling other odds and ends from the garden to liven up their cage!  more...

Hi Everyone!

I just found this community when I googled for foraging ideas for my birdies. Some awesome ideas you all have! Instead of doing a big introduction here, here's a link to a livejournal that I started:
http://love4birds.livejournal.com/
There's a couple foraging ideas in there as well as pictures of all my fids. I'm always trying to find new, exciting foraging ideas for the fids, so I'm very excited to come across your community!
  more...

vegetables as foraging toys

I finally got my hands on a couple of little bell peppers small enough to make into foraging "bowls" for my caiques! For yesterday's breakfast, I cut the lid off of one, cut out most of the white inner parts (leaving some seeds for them) and stuffed it with their fresh-food diet. I put the cap back on and then skewered the whole thing onto their hanging stainless steel skewer.

It was a HUGE hit! I came home to find only half of a bell pepper, well-chewed, left on their skewer. Awesome!

(A big thank-you to whoever made that suggestion! I can't remember who it was.)

I wanted to mix it up a little, so today I decided to use a cucumber instead. I've been getting a ton of cukes from my CSA, so it would be great if I could turn them into vessels for bird food. I sliced off the top and used a sharp knife and a small spoon to scoop out the insides. I stuffed the cavity with their sprouts and minced veggies and skewered it sideways on their hanging skewer.

Again, this was a huge hit! All that was left was a small stump of cucumber on the bottom of their cage.

I'm definitely going to put this idea into their daily foraging toy rotation from now on! I'll bet it would work with beets and large spicy peppers as well.  more...

Natural foraging: Star Anise

I discovered a nifty natural foraging treat at Whole Foods this weekend: whole star anise pods. My WF has them in the bulk spices section. My birds seem to like them! They don't always eat the seed, but they love ripping open the pods.

I wedge them in vine balls or other shredding toys for them to pull out and chew up, but they would also make good quickie foot toys for small to medium birds.  more...

Today's foraging ideas

Today's foraging:

Veggies and fruit on their hanging skewer.

Mash in a tiny terra cotta flowerpot on the skewer, capped with a round of summer squash.

1/3 of a banana still in its peel hung with a quick link. I made a couple of slits in the sides, but didn't make actual openings, so they've mostly been eating it from the bottom up.

A days-of-the-week pill box with TOP pellets and Nutriberries in the compartments zip tied to the bars of the cage. Daedalus has become a master at this one - I think I'm going to have to switch to one that's harder to get open!

Mash in paper "nut cups" (or appetizer cups) folded closed and put into a deep dish for them to pull out.

Snow peas stuck into their shredder toy.  more...