Water bottle problem ?

So i bought both my birds water bottles yesterday, the ones made for hamsters (also suitable for birds) with a ball bearing in the tube, they both figured it out instantly but my problem is they are drinking too much as they view it as a toy, especially Bella, droppings have been very watery, debating whether to leave them in and hope its just a phase as its new, is there a big risk to drinking lots of water for a day or two is my main question i guess

I've never heard of a bird damaging themselves by drinking too much, but I suggest calling a vet. Do be careful though because those are hard to sanitize properly.


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On the plus side this would be a good way to get some aloe Vera detox in them

The hype has died down since I added aloe Vera to the water bottle but they are still drinking abit, for now they both still have plain water in their bowls which I'm hoping to wean them off completely as they get far to messy fast ( my Alex is a dunker and galah bathes, poops and dunks and I'm not around to change the water every couple of hours.

Please DONT remove water bowls. This is natural behavior for them to dunk their food. Additionally, those water bottles can fail. If that happens and you aren’t aware, or worse if you are away, it will not end well for your birds. Birds have in fact died because of this exact scenario.

Messy is a part of parrot ownership. Especially surrounding food and water. This is not a place you should be cutting corners. I beg you reconsider this decision.

I'm well aware that messy is a part of parrot ownership, I'm just trying to do the best I can for them with my current lifestyle I also don't see how drinking poop amongst other bacteria's is good for them. No matter how much I change those bowls or even add additional water bowls, they still end drinking from dirty water and it bothers me.
Right now i'm not sold on the water bottles as being a definite solution mostly from the reasons you stated above but I think it's worth a try then add up the pro's to cons..
Some facts:
I work atleast 8 hours during most weekdays and noone else is around to change water. They stay in a outdoor balcony enclosure with shade etc during this time.
The bottles are positioned away from food and would be difficult to stuff pellets or anything else in there not to mention the size of the tube is rather small, also IF it was to fail it would be for not longer than 8 hours as I would be checking and cleaning it daily.

One big con that keeps popping up is how hard they are to clean properly which inturn would defeat the purpose I bought them

They will probably be far better off drinking from a dish that is washed out daily that has some feathers or food in it from the morning than out of a water bottle that could have hidden mold growing in it for who knows how long. Those things are notoriously hard to clean and known to be traps for harmful bacteria and mold that is very difficult/impossible to clean out.

As long as you're washing their dishes out every day, they'll be fine. If they are pooping in the dishes, that likely means a perch or platform is positioned above the dish. Move the spot they're pooping from over the water dish or put a coop cup style water dish (a screw on one instead of the built in ones) higher up in the cage where they can't poop in it anymore and leave the built in one empty. When you get home from work, give them fresh water if it's really dirty.

water doesn't mold? unless you use the bottle for something other than water like something sugary there is no reason to think that mold is growing. a lot of water bottles are made with microban or whatever if that is a concern just use those bottles. there is no real reason to expect a water bottle to start molding on it's own. Sometimes I wonder about you guys... everything is so dangerous. It's not any more dangerous than a bowl where lots of other things can contaminate, at least a water bottle is closed off from outside contaminates.

water can grow mold when sealed away, it just needs a tiny amount of oxygen to grow. In this case though there is frequent air from drinking, though I find water bottles risky day to day. For in a carrier I love the idea but to be honest it isn't exactly hard to replace a water bowl daily

I kept a water dispenser (the kind that silos water into a very small and narrow trough from a glass tube, essentially) thinking that it would keep the fids' water cleaner and be better in general theory.

In reality, it was a pain to remove and clean, you need a particular spout-brush to do so properly, and I haven't observed the fids are at any disadvantage for drinking out of a conventional dish/bowl. They dunk their food, and occasionally a feather gets in there, but a daily cleaning suffices to keep things in order; remember birds are creatures adapted to drinking not just rain water but standing water out of crevices and niches in the hollows and nooks of rain-forest foliage - stuff absolutely covered in mold and the like.

and hey, if they want to dunk their pellets who are we to stop them eating how they like? Pretty sure we would be annoyed if we were forced to say, eat a pizza with a knife and fork

LordTriggs said:

and hey, if they want to dunk their pellets who are we to stop them eating how they like? Pretty sure we would be annoyed if we were forced to say, eat a pizza with a knife and fork

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with chopsticks!

I use both water bottles and bowls for most of my birds, bowls seem to be used for eating and bottles for when they just want to drink thankfully. I only use glass and stainless steel bottles, no plastic, and a small amount of ACV in the bottles. They also get run through the dishwasher once a week on the sanitize setting. I've had no issues with mold or residue inside thankfully but I keep everything very clean.

Relocate the water bowl high up in their enclosure, too high for them to hover over it an poop. Try that see if it makes a difference. We change Saltys water bowl daily, but he is a very neat parrot and doesnt spend much time in cage. Even so, when I wash it out in the AM, the sides of it feel a bit 'slimey' . The inside of a water bottle feels much the same I'd imagine. How do you effectively clean the tube/spring/ball bearing? Can you boil it ? That might be effective.

wrench13 said:

Relocate the water bowl high up in their enclosure, too high for them to hover over it an poop. Try that see if it makes a difference. We change Saltys water bowl daily, but he is a very neat parrot and doesnt spend much time in cage. Even so, when I wash it out in the AM, the sides of it feel a bit 'slimey' . The inside of a water bottle feels much the same I'd imagine. How do you effectively clean the tube/spring/ball bearing? Can you boil it ? That might be effective.

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I have to agree! My stainless steel bowl is slimy every morning when I wash it, can only imagine a bottle! Find a way to keep the poop out and allow your buds the right to dunk food!

Water bottles are advertised as being much more sanitary, and sure, they might not be able to poop, bathe, and get food in them, but you have to worry about sanitizing them properly. I wanted to get my guys a glass water bottle with stainless steel parts, but of course, not a single manufacturer produces products without any plastic (I'm paranoid about all those endocrine disrupters and other nasty chemicals leeching from plastic). Oh, right, I wanted to get them the water bottle for enrichment purposes.

Right, so I just give my guys fresh water twice a day after first washing their stainless steel dishes with soap (Ecover) and water. Their dishes are NEVER slimy because I wash them so often (I'm kind of surprised they aren't all germy). Also, I hang them in spots that they don't want to hang out (one's on the left wall of the aviary, away from their cage and their giant apple tree branch; the other is in the cage hung up high and away from their food to make sure that Rumi, my flightless girl, can still drink).

For Australian species (excluding lories and lorikeets), you can put a single drop of unadulterated (most manufacturers add harmful chemicals to their essential oils, so be careful!) eucalyptus oil in with fresh water in a stainless steel dish. I just started doing this a couple of weeks ago for their baths, putting a few drops in a stainless steel macaw dish along with fresh water, and my budgies and kākāriki love it! I use Now essential oil, and I checked out the company and whatnot before I began using it (I started diffusing the essential oil last year when Charlie was getting respiratory infections from his medication).

Also, to make things less gross, why not have a large bathing/food dunking bowl (thereby diluting the germs), and a couple of tiny water dishes up high? Oh, and stainless steel all the way. That stuff doesn't leech chemicals, is easily disinfected, keeps the water cool (unless it's freaking hot in their enclosure), and I find it doesn't get slimy if washed regularly.

Kiwi's stainless water dish is never slimy. He isn't a big food dunker though, just the occasional piece of food that ends up in there by accident. Feathers are a common find in his dish. He is a near daily dish bath taker and typically needs an afternoon top up after his bath, but with how many baths a week (both dish and under the human shower) the bird takes, he's probably clean enough to eat off of anyways

Those water bottles apparently have mold and bacteria that builds up in the tube and ball part, not necessarily the bottle itself. I can only imagine how difficult those tubes must be to clean properly!

YUMgrinder said:

water doesn't mold? unless you use the bottle for something other than water like something sugary there is no reason to think that mold is growing. a lot of water bottles are made with microban or whatever if that is a concern just use those bottles. there is no real reason to expect a water bottle to start molding on it's own. Sometimes I wonder about you guys... everything is so dangerous. It's not any more dangerous than a bowl where lots of other things can contaminate, at least a water bottle is closed off from outside contaminates.

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The water in my area leaves a pink residue if left too long. And mildew could easily be a problem if mold isn’t.


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mold and algae. ALso try something like this:



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