Does anyone own a Yellow Collard Macaw?

If so how would you describe them. I know they are bigger then a hahns macaw but do they act the same?

My parents used to have a yellow collard. They say he was a very sweet and super intelligent bird. Unfortunately, he lost an eye in an aviary accident and was very traumatized and became extremely paranoid/aggressive after that. I was a toddler and they were scared he would remove one of my fingers, so they found him a girlfriend in a zoo breeding program and donated him (I guess at that time they were an endangered species, I'm not sure if they still are). They still check in on him from time to time, and he's still down there helping repopulate his species I wish I remembered him, but I was only 2 when this all happened. As I said, they say he was a very sweet bird until he had his accident.

I have 2 YCM's - Liberty and Faith. They are sisters from the same clutch. They were both born in August of 2012 and have been with me since December. I love them both to pieces :09:!! I have never had a Han's Macaw so I can't speak to differences between the 2 but I can tell you about my girls. They are both very smart, very active, very sweet but can be stubborn at times. But I think that goes with out saying for all birds. They both talk up a storm. Their speach isn't as clear as a CAG or possibly other macaws but my family knows what they are saying. . They love to be with me and love to cuddle. Neither of the girls are into the whole scratching thing but that may be because I have 2- they preen each other and break all those nasty pin feathers that they get for each other so they don't need my help.

I think that there are 2 others on the board that have YCM's as well- I know that Remy has one and one other person that I have seen recently on the board. I can't remember their name tho...sorry.

Here are a few pictures of my babies.... The first one is Liberty and the second one is Faith and the third one is the two girls together. <3

I have a ycm named koko she was a rescue that came to me about 8 months ago. She is great although when she came in her travel she got a foot caught and ripped a toe nail off. it has healed ok. koko is very playful and talkitive we are still working on gentle as she can take it to far... she knows probably 20 words and speaks in context she is a pig she will eat almost anything. They love toys and mine loves to swing and make sound. On the other side i have met ycm's that are extremely skittish and afraid and tend to be very reserved.

I had a hahns macaw as well but he ended up passing away. Same sort of temperament, they are still macaws and think they are the same as big macaws. So pretty much they are big macaws in a small macaw body. Still testy, and playful like larger macaws and very intuative. My hahns and yellow collared pretty much act the same temper wise. Although they can as well be reserved and so on depending on there past and current training and time spent with them.


sorry i uploaded some pictures from an ipad and it put them on there sides like this -.-

I have a friend who's tame YCM climbed up on her shoulder one night and bit through her lower lip, requiring stitches at the emergency room. So if you get one, be careful!

legal_eagle said:

I have a friend who's tame YCM climbed up on her shoulder one night and bit through her lower lip, requiring stitches at the emergency room. So if you get one, be careful!

Click to expand...

That doesn't mean all ycm are lip biters.... And to start she shouldn't have let her bird near her face. Look what happened to kiwi bird when her blue front got her nose this morning which he had never done before... All birds can bite so that doesn't mean one will be the same as the other. So to generalize and say all ycm will give you lip stitches is wrong. Having common knowledge of birds would be helpful in this situation.

End of my rant, sorry

Jtbirds said:

legal_eagle said:

I have a friend who's tame YCM climbed up on her shoulder one night and bit through her lower lip, requiring stitches at the emergency room. So if you get one, be careful!

Click to expand...

That doesn't mean all ycm are lip biters.... And to start she shouldn't have let her bird near her face. Look what happened to kiwi bird when her blue front got her nose this morning which he had never done before... All birds can bite so that doesn't mean one will be the same as the other. So to generalize and say all ycm will give you lip stitches is wrong. Having common knowledge of birds would be helpful in this situation.

End of my rant, sorry

Click to expand...

I couldn't have said it better myself. I was thinking the same thing but since you already said it won't.

And your YCM is adorable!

With the troubles of finding a Noble macaw I have seriously considered a YCM instead. They are sort of hard to find but a bit easier to find than a Nobel macaw. With the extensive research I have done on the YCM they remind me very much of a Illiger's macaw. They have a lot of the same personality traits and personally I think I could be very happy with a YCM.

I had a Illiger's macaw for almost 10 years. He was bonded to me and tolerated everyone else. He liked Lupe if I was not in the room and they had their own relationship. If I was to get a YCM I would do some things differently so that the YCM would accept more people then just one person. I also realize that this might be fighting the natural tendency of the YCM to be a one person parrot.

Do any YCM owners out there have ones that like all people instead of just one person?

My koko only really likes me in the house, but tolerates my father. Although I have her trained when she goes out to an outreach she will go to anyone. They can be social if taught to be, any parrot can in my mind. I really think that ycm can like more then one person pretty easily as any mini I have met have been very social and willing to learn from anyone other then a select one or two out of the probably twenty I have encountered.

Any breed of parrot much larger than a tiel' is capable of inflicting a serious bite, doesn't matter if it's a macaw, cockatoo, amazon, conure, eclectus ect.... Even the sweetest, most loving birds will get you sometimes. I don't really agree with singling out YCMs as "mean" because it's a natural thing for all parrots to do on occasion. If you own a parrot, guaranteed you will occasionally get bit, as anyone on this forum can tell you. It is part of parrot ownership, and something you have to be willing to deal with. It's not something that should scare you off of getting a bird, but is definitely something you need consider if your willing to deal with in the appropriate way before purchasing any kind of bird. Obviously, the smaller the beak, the less serious of a bite the bird is capable of, so keep that in mind too.

As stated, letting a bird near your face is ALWAYS a risk, and something you have the CHOICE to allow your bird to be that close. Many of us do kiss our birds/shoulder them/let them close to our faces, and have been bitten there. There are also plenty of people who will never let their bird near their face. That boils down to your level of trust with your bird and acceptance that the risk is always there. Kiwi did get my Jose the other day, and he's not the first bird who's bitten my face, nor the worst bite to the face I've ever got. I'm not stopping kissing him, it's a special bond we have (he won't kiss anyone but me), but I know in the future there may very well be another nose incident, and I'm accepting of that. Much like children, you make the choices in how you raise and interact with your bird.

Wanted to add- since this subject has been brought up, if you are curious about how bad parrot bites can be, you should check out the pics of what my little "angel" did the other morning. There was also another user who recently posted some pics of some bites she received from her macaw on her hands that were pretty gruesome too. There may be some others floating around as well, so I do encourage you to take a look and be the judge for yourself of what you feel on bites.

Jtbirds said:

legal_eagle said:

I have a friend who's tame YCM climbed up on her shoulder one night and bit through her lower lip, requiring stitches at the emergency room. So if you get one, be careful!

Click to expand...

That doesn't mean all ycm are lip biters.... And to start she shouldn't have let her bird near her face. Look what happened to kiwi bird when her blue front got her nose this morning which he had never done before... All birds can bite so that doesn't mean one will be the same as the other. So to generalize and say all ycm will give you lip stitches is wrong. Having common knowledge of birds would be helpful in this situation.

End of my rant, sorry

Click to expand...

No problem, as I actually agree with you. But a budgie won't send you to the emergency room! It seems the don't let them on your shoulder rule is honored mostly by being breached.

noblemacaw said:

With the troubles of finding a Noble macaw I have seriously considered a YCM instead. They are sort of hard to find but a bit easier to find than a Nobel macaw. With the extensive research I have done on the YCM they remind me very much of a Illiger's macaw. They have a lot of the same personality traits and personally I think I could be very happy with a YCM.

I had a Illiger's macaw for almost 10 years. He was bonded to me and tolerated everyone else. He liked Lupe if I was not in the room and they had their own relationship. If I was to get a YCM I would do some things differently so that the YCM would accept more people then just one person. I also realize that this might be fighting the natural tendency of the YCM to be a one person parrot.

Do any YCM owners out there have ones that like all people instead of just one person?

Click to expand...

Noble,

My breeder usually has YCM babies. They are in the process of moving to a bigger building so their flock of babies is running low right now. If you haven't found a baby YCM locally by the time they have some I would be happy to go and socialize/love on a baby for you. You can check Dave and Tammy out on the web at DJ Feathers.com if you are interested. My girls were raised by hand in a home until they were old enough to come out in to the general population. Then not only did I get to love on them all I could but they were handled by who knows how many other people so they were very well socialized by the time I was able to bring my girls home.

My girls will tolerate everyone. But if they had their choice Liberty would only be with me and Faith well we are still trying to figure her out. Faith and my husband do seem to have a really strong bond but she does try to fly to me when I'm in the room. As soon as they see my daughter (she's 13 and bounces around the house a lot) they start dancing. My boys really don't try much with the birds so there's really nothing I can say regarding their relationship with them Honestly, I wish they would do more with the girls but I'm not going to force them if they don't want to 'cause we all know how that could turn out .

My RFM is bonded to me pretty strongly. He prefers me to anyone else. It is my hope that when the weather gets warmer I will be able to socialize him better after spending all winter with just Lupe and I.

I went to your breeders website and was impressed. Their prices seem pretty fair and I like that the birds are well socialized and very healthy. So you would be willing to go and visit my baby huh? That would be awesome and you can send me pictures and update me about the baby. LOL. I would consider them for my next baby if we don't go the rescue route. Right now having TWO babies would be too much. Valentino is a handful and is more than enough for me right now. The cage would be put in my office and the baby would be quarantined there.

I have Darcy, and he/she is great! He isn't a big talker, but is very sweet, affectionate, snuggly, and definitely intelligent. He's not particularly vocal in general, compared to other birds. Screams rarely, only occasionally when he's left alone. Most vocalizations are small and relatively quiet.

He was shy with new people at first, but I started taking him places with me on a regular basis, and now he steps up for a lot of strangers (at his own discretion, lol), and will start doing happy dances on them if he likes them enough.

Very opinionated, but gives warning nips instead of flat-out biting. If I continue to do what he doesn't like, he'll nip harder. Basically, if you get bit from Darcy, it's 100% your fault because you had plenty of warning. He's pretty good about being shoulder possessive, but sometimes he doesn't want me to remove him when he is on someone else's shoulder (but still hasn't given a REAL bite, just mean nips), but if I approach him the right way I can still pick him up. Even if he protests, he still lets me pick him up.

He DEFINITELY knows he is a macaw! I took him into a bird shop that has some big macaws, who decided to have a screamfest while I was in there. Darcy joined right in, and showed me his BEST scream, which he had spared me until that point. LOL.

Overall, he's is a great bird with a great personality and temperment!

aboyce76 said:

noblemacaw said:

With the troubles of finding a Noble macaw I have seriously considered a YCM instead. They are sort of hard to find but a bit easier to find than a Nobel macaw. With the extensive research I have done on the YCM they remind me very much of a Illiger's macaw. They have a lot of the same personality traits and personally I think I could be very happy with a YCM.

I had a Illiger's macaw for almost 10 years. He was bonded to me and tolerated everyone else. He liked Lupe if I was not in the room and they had their own relationship. If I was to get a YCM I would do some things differently so that the YCM would accept more people then just one person. I also realize that this might be fighting the natural tendency of the YCM to be a one person parrot.

Do any YCM owners out there have ones that like all people instead of just one person?

Click to expand...

Noble,

My breeder usually has YCM babies. They are in the process of moving to a bigger building so their flock of babies is running low right now. If you haven't found a baby YCM locally by the time they have some I would be happy to go and socialize/love on a baby for you. You can check Dave and Tammy out on the web at DJ Feathers.com if you are interested. My girls were raised by hand in a home until they were old enough to come out in to the general population. Then not only did I get to love on them all I could but they were handled by who knows how many other people so they were very well socialized by the time I was able to bring my girls home.

My girls will tolerate everyone. But if they had their choice Liberty would only be with me and Faith well we are still trying to figure her out. Faith and my husband do seem to have a really strong bond but she does try to fly to me when I'm in the room. As soon as they see my daughter (she's 13 and bounces around the house a lot) they start dancing. My boys really don't try much with the birds so there's really nothing I can say regarding their relationship with them Honestly, I wish they would do more with the girls but I'm not going to force them if they don't want to 'cause we all know how that could turn out .

Click to expand...

Like noblemacaw I am looking for a mini macaw too. I found a breeder a state away but it is going to be awhile before they have any babies maybe next year at the earliest. I am thinking about either a Hahns, or Yellow Collard Macaw. I do not know if I should consider a Illiger's Maccaw or not. If anyone knows of a breeder or thinks they will have any weened babies in the future feel free to message me. There is not many breeders in Kansas. I am thinking of making some phone calls but I am not holding my breather that there are an breeders in my state that breed min macaws. I know one breeder stoped breeding birds and now breeds sugar gliders.

Thanks to everyone who posted. Your comments are helping me understand my new bird.

I just found out she in 12, not 2.5 yo. I was worried that she is trying lay an egg at a young age. Now I need to find a male to breed her sometime in the future.

eickhorn said:

... Now I need to find a male to breed her sometime in the future.

Click to expand...

Why?

You are new to birds, just enjoy her for a while before rushing into something so in-depth, difficult, and dangerous as breeding parrots.

Not to say you shouldn't have that as an eventual goal; nothing wrong with working towards that. But I would suggest taking it slow and really getting to know the world of birds before you try and take on the formidable task of raising them.

Like, take a few years at least would be my advice.

bug_n_flock said:

eickhorn said:

... Now I need to find a male to breed her sometime in the future.

Click to expand...

Why?

You are new to birds, just enjoy her for a while before rushing into something so in-depth, difficult, and dangerous as breeding parrots.

Not to say you shouldn't have that as an eventual goal; nothing wrong with working towards that. But I would suggest taking it slow and really getting to know the world of birds before you try and take on the formidable task of raising them.

Like, take a few years at least would be my advice.

Click to expand...

I have no intention of making quick moves. Im just looking forward.
Bob

why are you suddenly looking to breed her? Or was this the plan all along?

If you want a pet bird breeding is among the worst ideas, they often times completely turn on humans. If you want a happy pet then don't breed her, they don't need babies to live happily