Should I get a Parrot?

Amazon If you are here reading this, you could say you have passed the first test. You show a level of intelligence and interest such that you would want to find out a few things before making the decision to keep a parrot. But read on, even if you already have a parrot and are now busy learning more about the new member of your family.

Parrots are just different than other animals kept as pets. Of course every sort of animal is unique, but parrots are different in ways that people who keep them really benefit from understanding in order to deal with them.

First of all, parrots are not low maintenance animals. You could acquire a parrot and just keep it in a cage and give it food, but it would not be happy, and pretty soon you would not be either.

Parrots live a long time; many of them can outlive their owners if they are kept healthy. Parrots are very intelligent, and this is both very cool, but also very demanding, or you end up with a bored psychotic parrot.

If treated inappropriately, parrots can develop bad habits such as biting, screaming, and self-mulilation. Parrots are highly emotional, and their emotions can swing wildly in a very short amount of time.

Parrots need to be understood and accepted for what they are. Not that they can cannot be trained in certain ways, but it is easy to expect things of them that they cannot deliver; unless you understand birds in general, and parrots in particular. If you know how to relate to dogs, cats, or other animals, you will need to rethink some things to deal with birds. Perhaps the best way to view this is that with a large parrot, you and the bird will need to come to a mutual agreement about how you view each other and your relationship. A parrot in many ways has to be viewed as an equal with certain rights that must be respected, and will never offer the complete obedience and subservience that a dog will. A parrot will indeed form a strong bond with its human caretakers, but this is a relationship based on trust, and that must be forged over a substantial period of time.

All this being said, the above is indeed intend to discourage you from owning a parrot, or at least make you stop and think hard about it and decide if you can make the sort of commitment that is needed to meet the needs of such an intelligent and amazing animal. There are enough stories about parrots that have been acquired impulsively, or that have lived miserable lives because their owners have not understood their unique nature and needs, that people like myself who appreciate these animals want to spell things out in such a way as to hopefully discourage those who just aren't matched to one of these creatures, and to inform thos who are. If you are still with me, read on and learn all you can, because as with any relationship that requires a substantial commitment, the rewards are correspondingly great.

The little parrot in the upper right was found on a publicity website for the Cayman Islands and it certainly looks like a Cuban Amazon (Amazona leucocephala).


Have any comments? Questions? Drop me a line!

Tom's parrot pages / tom@mmto.org