Hardest types of parrots to handle

[MenomaMinx]

They have medicine now for hormonal birds, but it's not very well distributed knowledge :-(
I've heard about the injections vaguely before, but I just learned about the implant recently – it's about the size of her grain of rice and has to be replaced every so often.
We wouldn't hesitate to medicate a human with hormonal imbalances that were disrupting their life and their interactions with others. I have a couple of friends on hormonal replacement therapy, and they speak highly of it. What I don't understand is why it's not being more widely given to the birds that otherwise are being either written off or literally writing themselves off through self harm.
The owner I talked to the other day said he believed it was the expense involved – but he has a Quaker – which makes this a surgical placement precision thing because of the size of the bird. You usually see this done to larger birds for the same hormonal behavior that would have no problem taking a grain of rice implant – it's the exact same size as the microchip used to track lost birds {and all of my birds were chipped}
If anybody needs the info, I can try to track down the medicine involved so they can make an informed decision with their vet.

 

[DallyTsuka]

i personally do not trust lupron or other hormonal methods. few reasons. one, ive been warned that they DO have some serious side effects. two, personally i have had bad experiences with hormone-related medications and cannot be on them at all. i wont do something to my bird that i wouldnt do to myself that's my own personal choice though.

but still, there are a lot of records where lupron doesnt work on birds either in some cases and thats also another factor in it. but the health and expense reasons, thats where i think chronic layers are a potentially really hard bird to handle.

 

[DallyTsuka]

I've never dealt with a chronic egg layer. I have worked with pluckers, and they are the most difficult behaviors to stop in my opinion. And the saddest thing of all, is that this is so often preventable with the right amount of interaction and socialization, and structure, from an early age. But stopping it once it starts is hard!

I wasn't kidding when I said I have had zero luck at all with handling lovebirds and would much rather handle a large macaw.

Lovebirds bite me every single time...

Macaws and I understand one another for the most part...

right there. that's my point, its based on personal choice i think that defines the most difficult birds to handle. its rather interesting all the replies people have.


and yes, lovebirds are very deceptive. look soooo adorable BUT can pack a very very nasty punch! they're fire breathing dragon ninjas, simple as that

 

[MenomaMinx]

i personally do not trust lupron or other hormonal methods. few reasons. one, ive been warned that they DO have some serious side effects. two, personally i have had bad experiences with hormone-related medications and cannot be on them at all. i wont do something to my bird that i wouldnt do to myself that's my own personal choice though.

but still, there are a lot of records where lupron doesnt work on birds either in some cases and thats also another factor in it. but the health and expense reasons, thats where i think chronic layers are a potentially really hard bird to handle.

I've only heard the good things, so what could happen that's worse than it doesn't work?

I was about to recommend it as a vet conversation option to someone with a CAG who is working his way to being bald.

Speaking for myself, I probably should live in the endocrinologist's office. I spent six months in the hospital for clockable fibromyalgia attacks(supposed to be impossible, but I'm getting to that)

Here's how it breaks down:

I'm a vegetarian with sky high cholesterol – hospital knew this.

I have Asperger's(which is basically genius IQ with low social IQ type autism)-hospital knew this.

Asperger's specifically has a lot of weird comorbidities, one of which involves cortisol levels in the bloodstream. Normal people peak in the morning and it goes down during the day. People with Asperger's get stuck with what they have left over from the night before when they wake up.

Remember the cholesterol I mentioned?

It's high, because my body doesn't make anything from it – specifically cortisol.

So the symptoms would kick in about 5 o'clock in the afternoon and if I wasn't asleep by nine I would scream myself hoarse –-I have very nasty vocal cord nodules(read scars) from this experience.

Fibromyalgia attacks are actually comparable/worse than final stage cancer pain according to the experts – ironically so, since that's the ward they put me on lacking an actual pain treatment center at that hospital.

So here's how you treat it.

Hydrocortisone 5 mg tablets. Three at noon. Two at midnight. Two at the onset of a fibromyalgia attack as an emergency measure.

Incredibly simple.

They screwed this up for six months, despite my own endocrinologist demanding to test for this very early on,and that's only one of the 2 1/2 pages of medical conditions I deal with daily.

Knowing what I know concerning how they treat humans with comorbidities firsthand, I'm very concerned with how they treat parrots-- I seriously wonder how many birds in rescues are there for medical issues they can't vocalize in an understandable way. So they yank their feathers, mutilate their flesh, or produce symptoms that appear to be hormonal imbalance or behavioral psychosis -- but we can't label a cause....... and cause-and-effect is everything, so there's always a cause.

 

[DallyTsuka]

well, i was warned about it causing some pretty nasty side effects, one of which can be serious bone pain. birds cant really tell us they are in pain. plus, for humans, it causes a whole host of other problems, so if they happen in people, they can happen in birds. bone pain, depression, severe headaches, severe vomiting, numbness/tingling in limbs, irregular heartbeat... these are listed for humans. there's more but you get the point.


if you do a search online, you can research a lot of the side effects of medications.


but this thread isnt about that its about the most difficult birds to handle. i can tell you, its quite frustrating having your bird just spit out egg after egg and no matter what you try she always finds a way to do it anyways. its a constant worry: "am i going to wake up and find her dead from egg binding?" with munch, its not so bad now that we've found her trigger. it seems to have greatly reduced her hormone level. but some people dont find the trigger for the hormones or have difficulty with it. thats why i would class chronic layers as one of the most difficult. because if they do go the implant or lupron route, its very expensive as well, which can be difficult to keep up with for most people.


pluckers, finding the cause is hard, but plucking itself might lead to a bald bird. if i had to choose, i'd rather deal with just a plucker than a mutilator or chronic layer. mutilators physically injure themselves and egg layers seem to like hurting their bums spitting out eggs left and right

 

[Betrisher]

DallyTsuka, how is Munchlax going now? I find myself wondering about her as our little Mango (who got stolen) was a chronic egg-layer as well. Is Munch still laying or attempting to nest, or has finding her trigger stopped all that?

 

[WeimerHeimer]

My wife and I have been bitten by:

- Military Macaw, 2 times
- Blue & Gold Macaw, 2 times
- Greenwinged Macaw, 1 time
- Goffin Cockatoo, 1 time
- Senegal Parrot, 1 time
- Pacific Parrotlet ..... lost count at this point

For some reason my wife seems to have the worst luck with bites. She lost 1 finger nail, 1 thumbnail, and had 3 stitches in her forefinger knuckle.

When you have birds .......... expect to get bitten. Comes with the territory.

 

[Birdman666]

Exactly! Way more likely to get bit by the Parrotlet than the macaw!

But you can also train them to pinch rather than bite. It still hurts, but bruises (and I have a few right now) beat punctures by a mile!

 

[ann]

I would second the M2 and U2 or large macaw. Although I was never bitten by one, I expect to because I plan to work with rescues in the future. I am trying to "prepare myself" for worse bites so I can go into rescue with more confidence. So far, the worst have been from various Amazon's and small cockatoos, and it hurts, but I have gotten used to it. Honestly though, the bites that make me want to scream are from green cheek conures and a hahns macaw.

Were you serious about the gcc and hahns?

I haven't been really bitten remotely hard to break skin or even say ouch but I'm guessing the bigger the beak the more its gonna hurt. My mother in laws umb2 and gwm have serious beaks on them so I stay away! Heck the afg makes me timid to get close to him!

Yep lol, the GCCs rarely break my skin (they can though) but they get a small piece of skin and pinch so hard. I guess its because they put all the force in such a small piece of skin. The hahns just had it out for me lol. The cockatoos have two points on their lower beak so it hurts more, and the Amazon's are just very strong. As much as it hurts, I'm glad birds have such strong beaks. If they didn't have the potential to do damage, no one would respect them.

 

[Terry57]

I went to that cockatoo site and the stories there broke my heart. How can people treat animals this way? I will never understand.