Macaws outside

I've been taking a stroll through the picture albums here and have noticed a lot of Macaws outside sitting calmly on tree branches. I've also noticed that there were not any harnesses in any of the pictures (that I saw). Are those of you that are taking your macaws outdoors not worried that they will fly away. Personally, even if my macaw's wings were clipped I'd be afraid she could catch a gust of wind and end up flying dangerously far away.

You absolutely would be in serious danger of losing your macaw trusting that they would not fly away. All three of my macaws regularly get wing feathers trimmed so I never have to worry about them flying away or accidentally getting out the front door. When my B&G Kayko came to me at the age of 20 he was a real flier. The first day he landed in the spaghetti sauce on the stove. The second day he hit the ceiling fan. The third day he slammed into the sliding glass door at about 25 MPH. (I still don't know how he survived that episode) I then realized I had to do something. Bird trim people come to my house and trim all three for $36. In the pictures below, the first one is day #1 with Kayko and his wings not trimmed. The second picture shows what a good 10 feather trim should look like. He can break his fall but not fly and it does not hurt him. The other two macaws I have have never flown. When their wings are folded up you can hardly tell they are trimmed. Click thumbnails to enlarge the pictures.

wing clips usually will stop a bird from flying all the can usually do is a c controlled fall HOWEVER I have seen birds with clipped wings fly up up and away! If they really want to they can especially the larger birds!!! Don't trust a wing clip to take your bird outside they need a harness to be certain they cant fly away! edit: many people free flight train their birds on a harness and then let tehir birds fly outside withought fearing they will fly away personally I wouldnt trust it but many people do it and dont have problems after they have fully trained their bird you can google it

Never let any parrot outside (clipped or flighted) without a harness! (Unless you are 120% sure that your parrot will fly back to you on command, and that it is a experienced flyer) There is a huge risk of loosing your feathered friend!

Clipping a parrot does helps the distance it can fly, however, on a windy day outside, a clipped parrot can fly just like a flighted one! Ozzie my alexandrine is clipped, but if you go to my album, you can have a look at the photos of him flying in his aviator harness outside.

And especially with the species that have long tail feathers, like alexandrine, ringneck and macaw. Longer tail feathers will help a clipped parrot to fly higher!

Normally when they clip macaws they do a 7 feather trim. Mine have a 10 feather trim and they CANNOT fly even in a 30 MPH wind. Been there done that. However, my son has three cockatiels and those I swear you could cut all the feathers off and they still could fly. Greenwings are a heavier bodied macaw and require a slightly different wing clip to keep them from smashing their breastbone when they land. Any bird will flap his wings on the way down anymore than you could fall over without sticking out your arm. Removing half of the first ten primary flight feathers they cannot get airspeed.

There is a TON of threads on this very topic.