Because they are so young, a handfed baby will need special care, especially in the first few days in a new home. Here I will go into what must be prepared beforehand for the birdie, and what to do and expect for the first few days in their new home. Doing things properly will help you to have a happy and healthy baby, one that will grow up to be friendly and companionable and confident and loving. Doing things wrong can lead to sickness and injury, and instill negative traits such as fear and distrust. This can affect their behaviors for the rest of their lives.
Helping me with this video are 26 new, almost weaned babies, having a little playtime with me. At this stage of development, I like to have them out and about as much as possible. A little extra flight practice, a little extra contact and poop training, and a little more fun for me.
Full Transcript---------------------------------------------------
Bringing home a new bird
Hello all, today I will be talking about bringing home a new, hand fed baby parrot. What needs to be done to ensure a safe transition, and a happy and healthy baby. Budgies, lovies, linnies, cockatiels, conures, quakers and all the rest. I will go into what to have ready ahead of time, and what to do for the first few days. Getting them well settled into their new home and their new lives with their new people! I will also go into what behaviors to expect in the first few days, especially with the smaller budgies, and what can be done to help them. Many people do become alarmed with some of these behaviors, but they are a natural part of the transition process.
Then I will go into why all this is important, and what makes a handfed baby so different from those purchased at a pet store. Doing everything right will help you to have a happy and healthy baby, one that will grow up to be friendly and companionable and confident and loving. Doing things wrong can lead to sickness and injury, and instill negative traits such as fear and distrust. This can affect their behaviors for the rest of their lives. Remember, these handfed birds are still babies, they are not the semi-tame or untame adults or young adults that come from pet stores or as my rescue rehomings. Being so young and so impressionable, they do need special care!
First, what to have prepared. All preparations for bringing home a new baby should be completed ahead of time.
A suitably sized cage should be ready and place adjacent to, but not in the middle, of household activity. The cage should be a full sized cage, one that will be their permanent home. I have heard some people recommending using a smaller temporary cage for the first few days, but this just means that the baby will be stressed. They will feel confined, without room to retreat if something scares them. This will also mean that they will have to go through another adjustment period when going into another cage. We want to do as few cage moves as possible. Make sure the cage is placed up against a wall to help the baby feel more secure. This gives them a safe space to face away from, without the added stress of having to watch their backs. Make sure that food and water dishes are within easy reach of the perches, and do not include too many toys, one or two will be enough. Make sure that any points of escape from the cage are secured, extra sliding doors are tied down and the latches work properly. Ensure that there are no environmental hazards such as cold drafts, direct sunlight or cooking smells. On my Facebook page and web site you will find my full bird care guide, with a large section on toxic hazards, everything from scented candles to Teflon cookware to toxic foods like avocado and garlic.
This is also a good time to bird proof your home, taking special care of open doors and windows, uncovered glass, ceiling fans and other dangers. I also do recommend having a babies wings partially clipped, for the safety of the bird. This is usually something I do in front of new owners when picking up a baby. This in no way means a full clip, where the baby cannot fly. A partial clip leaves the first two longest feathers on each wing, then takes the next three or four and leaves all the ones after. The baby will still be able to fly just fine, just not as fast. They will still be able to fly up from the floor and fly around the room. They just will not be able to get the full speed flight that could result in injury or death if they hit an unfamiliar wall or uncovered window. It will take the baby several days to get used to the new wings, and until then the limited top speed is a good idea. A full clip, where a baby cannot achieve flight at all or just for very short periods, is never a good idea. It is a cruel practice and leads to serious flight, health and behavior problems as they mature.
It is also important to have a good supply of the food you plan on feeding them. For the first several days this should only be an appropriate seed mix and spray millet. The spray millet is important to encourage feeding, all birds love the millet and will start eating that first. For seed I use mother natures seed mix, from chin ridge in Alberta, a Canadian grown product! You can find these seed mixes, made specifically for your breed of bird, at many stores including Just for Birds in Langley. It is a good, basic seed mix without any of the added junk food and fillers that many big box store seed mixes contain. Plus, being a local product and not shipped in from overseas, you know it is fresh.
Pellets can be offered after several days, although I no longer use or recommend any brand of pellets. They are a cheap and easy way to provide other nutrients, but remember they are after all an ultra processed food source.
A much better source of nutrients and vitamins can be found by offering your birds chop, at least 3 or 4 times a week if not daily. Offering chop can be started after 3 or 4 days, once the babies have settled in and are eating well. Giving it to them too soon can aggravate the inevitable case of the runs they will get after a move into a new home, something I will go more into detail on later. You can find my full chop recipe on my Facebook page and web site as well, and a video on the preparation and feeding will be up here shortly.
Now onto what to do when the baby arrives!
When you get home, put your bird in the cage carefully. Make sure they don't fly off and harm themselves in a panic. You can put the box into a larger cage and open it in there. You can also partially open the box, hold it up to a cage door, and open it the rest of the way facing inside. If needed, you can also slip your hand inside the box, carefully pick the bird up, and transfer it to the cage. It might help to have a light towel handy, or a bird net just in case, especially with the squidgy lovebirds. We want to avoid stress here as much as possible. Again, make sure all doors are closed, windows are covered, and ceiling fans turned off before making the transfer.
Once the baby is in the cage, it is time to let them be! They need time to adjust to the new surroundings. No matter how cute they are, how much you want to show them off, or how much the kids want to have them perch on their fingers, let your bird be! For the first day simply let them get used to their new cages with all the new sights, sounds and smells of their new home. By all means talk to your new bird, but keep everyone calm and quiet. Remember, a newly weaned bird is still a baby! By the second day they might be able to be handled for short periods, once you see them eating and drinking well on their own.
Budgies can be especially skittish during this time, they do take a move harder than most other birds, and sometimes take a few more days before you see them eating and being active. Once they have settled in a little bit they can be handled for short periods, 10 minutes at a time a few times a day for smaller or more timid birds, half an hour for the more confident conures and quakers. You can slowly increase the time and frequency as days go by. Do this when a bird becomes more settled in and comfortable, and you see them eating with enthusiasm.
Budgies especially are often in a state of shock when they arrive in a new home, and you might not see them eat or drink for a day or two as they acclimate. This is normal and it will pass, just keep them warm and quiet and stress free. It is totally understandable for everyone in your family to want to play and spend time with a new baby birdie. Just remember that until this time the baby has only known one person. They have only been handled by one person in a calm nursery, and have only interacted with other baby birds. Having several people trying to handle the bird, chase the bird around the room if it flies away, being passed from new person to the next, and being handled by understandably excited young children, can be very stressful. Even if your new bird seems super friendly and eager to have contact, they are still being stressed and over excited. If this over excited condition goes on too long, or is induced too often in the first few days, it can lead to injury, illness and even death. Heart attacks and strokes are possible, as well as panic induced injury and stomach upset. An overly stressed bird, one that experiences ongoing stresses without time to recover, might never get over this shock state, never start eating, and literally starve themselves.
After the first two or three days your bird will be much calmer and easier to handle. More timid birds such as parrotlets, lovebirds and especially handfed budgies, might require more patience than the more outgoing conures and quakers, but each bird is as different as each family. Sometimes they are super happy and friendly right from day one, and love to cuddle and play. Sometimes it can take a few days to a few weeks to get that cuddly little ball of feathers that loves to spend all day on your shoulder pressed into your neck. Patience and routine is the key, calm and confident handling, and of course treats always help.
A good place to start is simply being around the cage, talking to the bird, feeding them treats from your hand, putting your hand in the cage and having the bird step up. Then letting it out of the cage to fly around, having the bird step down from your finger to your arm or shoulder, and just spending time together. In the end it will all come down to the time you spend together.
Now onto what behaviors to expect from your new baby in the first few days. This applies to all breeds to some extent or another, but especially to budgies. It is in these smaller birds that these behaviors will be most evident. Parrots are great pets, and in fact are the third most popular pet after dogs and cats. But they do have their challenges. Where these little guys come from, they are prey birds and still behave as such in our homes. They do tend to be fearful and cautious until they get used to the fact that they are not about to be eaten. This drive for self preservation presents itself in several different ways that you will be able to observe, and have to work with, during the first few days.
Behaviour #1. The fearful stillness. Not moving, singing, chattering, or doing much of anything.... budgies especially will do this for the first day or two whenever they go through a move, but is also been seen in other breeds. Often a baby will stay on a perch, or even the floor of their cage, completely motionless. They do this to not draw attention to themselves from any potential predators. Best thing to do is just stay out of their way, and let them observe the activity in your household. Let them get used to the sights, sounds and smells that are all new to them. Don't put your hands into the cage if you do not have to, and don't let young children bang on the sides of the cage or move it around. Don't take them out to play yet, and don't put your face right up to the cage or try to get them to move a little. After a while you will see that they become more active, less fearful, and more eager to explore and play. Trying to go too fast will just reinforce negative behaviour, and make it harder to get them to trust in the future. Even hand fed babies, handled several times daily, will show this fearful behavior at first. The move from the nursery to a new home, away from their clutch mates and all the familiar faces and sounds, is very traumatic. Having more than one bird, they being so social and having a high flock drive, will help, but not completely alleviate this behavior. Most new birds are actually in a state of shock when they go through a move, and will need some time to work things out for themselves.
Playing the companionship videos, found on my YouTube channel and website, can also help them feel more safe and secure. It can help them with homesickness and loneliness, seeing familiar sights and hearing familiar background sounds.
Behaviour #2 Not eating anything, will they starve? One of the scarier traits of a new baby is not eating or drinking for the first day or two. Or at least you will not see them eat or drink, but they often will when there is nobody around and all is quiet. Even then, they will only eat a little bit, and even hide the evidence. They do this because eating and drinking puts them in a position thats very vulnerable to attack from predators, and since they're not totally convinced yet that you aren’t a threat, they will eat and drink when you’re gone. Check to see if there are seed hulls in the food bowl, thats an indication they are eating while you’re not around. This is why good quality spray millet is important. Spray millet is a great treat for birds, especially budgies, and they just can't help themselves when it is available. For the first two or three weeks they can have some every day, the high fat and protein content will encourage them to eat, help them grow, and help them feather up and adjust.
Behaviour #3 The poops, the runs, the trots........Yup, babies can get the "Fear Poops". This commonly happens to birds that are under stress, and a move to a new home for a baby is a great amount of stress. Many birds will also shoot out a fear poop when startled. I once dropped a heavy book with a big bang in the main bird room. Everything went completely quiet instantly, except for a couple hundred little "plops". No panicking, no flapping or screeching, every bird was completely still with their eyes glued on me. But pretty much every bird lightened their load, so to say. They know me as their flock leader, and all were waiting for me to give them the all clear. There is not much to do about the poops. Clean their backsides if it gets caked, and only feed millet and seed at first, no fruits, veggies, chop, other treats, supplements or pellets. I have never had to deal with birdie diarrhea lasting longer than a day or two, but if it goes longer you can give electrolyte solution in their water dish (think Pedialyte, or electrolyte power), and some people swear on a drop or two of kaopectate or pepto bismol. I have never had to do this, so some research or a call to your vet on your end will have to be done. Also make sure to use stainless steel for food and water bowls, as plastic, stone, resin or other materials can harbour bacteria.
Why is all this important? The first few days for your new bird are very important for you and your new friend, and special care must be taken to make this transition as easy and low stress as possible. You want to form a good, strong and healthy bond with your bird based on trust and comfort. Bringing home a handfed baby is much different than picking up a bird from a pet store or mass commercial breeder. These pet store birds are usually quite a bit older, or at least it has been longer since they have been weaned. They have already been through quite a lot in terms of travel, and have already learned hot to adapt themselves to many different environments in a short period of time. As well they usually sit and wait in a pet store for quite some time before being purchased, all while being exposed to multiple people looking in at them each day, tapping on the glass or poking fingers into cages. There are even pet stores around here that keep fully clipped parrots in open topped aquariums, allowing people to get a good and close look. Those were some very still and nervous looking parrots! All this means that a parrot brought home from a pet store has already been hardened, and as harsh at it seems, the younger or more sensitive ones have already been culled out. I have heard the term acceptable losses several times about large scale breeding facilities.
A hand fed baby parrot or budgie from a responsible and ethical breeder is very different. They are usually re homed between 8 and 10 weeks of age, a week after being fully weaned from formula onto solid food. They have spent all their lives in a warm safe place getting the best of care. For a ethical breeder, there is no such thing as acceptable losses. Their only move up to now would have been from the brooder into a nearby grow up cage. They have had the time and contact to get comfortable with the handfeeder and maybe a few other family members. They will have spent their whole lives in the company of their clutch-mates and the other babies in the nursery. They will not have had the experience of multiple moves, multiple people, or multiple new environments. Because of all this special care must be taken when bringing a new baby home, steps must be taken and these special considerations taken into account.
Well, that's it for today, hopefully this has answered some questions, but if anyone has any more let me know in the comments! Remember, when bringing a new baby birdie into the home, keep them quiet, keep them calm, keep them warm and keep them as stress free as possible until they have had time to fully settle in and get used to all the new stimuli. A little extra time and consideration right at the beginning will make things much easier later on, and result in a happy and healthy, and friendly, companion bird.