Interesting take on Eclectus

[Thechoplady]

I was recently speaking with someone who studied eclectus parrots in the wild. He says they act very much like Lorys. I had never heard this before so after speaking with him, I naturally had to look it up on the internet and I found an old article titled "Eclectus parrots, the biggest lory of them all".

The Grandest Lory of Them All - by Dale R. Thompson

I wanted to ask those of you that have experience with both species, do you see similarities? Also, im wondering if I should be giving my girl more fruit. I restrict her fruit due to hormonal behavior as i try to limit her sugar, but im starting to wonder if maybe the ekkies that toe tap, wing flip, etc. are doing so because they are missing something that the wild ekkies are getting from the large amount of fruit they regularly consume.

 

[kme3388]

I do work with multiple parrot species. I have a male Ekkie. He doesn’t eat any fresh food for me aside from the sweet red mini peppers. He is offered bird tricks seasonal feeding system regardless daily. He just picks out the noodles of any chop. I will say Nico doesn’t play with toys like all of my other parrots. He also is unable to break open nuts. I have to crack them for him so he can at least forage a little. I did find 2 toys he sometimes picks at… pine cones, and sola balls with treats in them. It’s like he doesn’t have the beak strength for bird toys that are sold on the market.

 

[LaManuka]

I find it interesting that Eclectus were once classified taxonomically in the genus Lorius, according to that article. There are, I think, enough differences between them to warrant Eclectus having their own classification, but the similarities between the two groups are certainly evident. I've only ever had the much smaller species of lorikeets myself, but leaving the Australian species aside for the moment, there are a lot of correlations between the larger, stockier Asiatic lories and Eclectus. I cannot speak for the Eclectus diet, having never had one, but when I had my purple crowned lorikeet hen we had to try very hard to keep her diet a bit lower in sugar/fruits, in an attempt to lessen her extremely aggressive behaviour during her 6 month long annual breeding season - and let me tell you that was not easy!! The other two lorikeets I've had have been roosters and it doesn't seem to be nearly as much of an issue for them. But to me, yes, I certainly do agree there is a fair bit of crossover between those two genera.

 

[Thechoplady]

I do work with multiple parrot species. I have a male Ekkie. He doesn’t eat any fresh food for me aside from the sweet red mini peppers. He is offered bird tricks seasonal feeding system regardless daily. He just picks out the noodles of any chop. I will say Nico doesn’t play with toys like all of my other parrots. He also is unable to break open nuts. I have to crack them for him so he can at least forage a little. I did find 2 toys he sometimes picks at… pine cones, and sola balls with treats in them. It’s like he doesn’t have the beak strength for bird toys that are sold on the market.

When it comes to nuts, Sophie is the same! I have to break them open a bit for her as she just cant crack them by herself. She also will only play with either foraging toys or very soft wood toys. She never touches any toy that has hard woods.

 

[kme3388]

I just feel bad when I see photos online of Ekkie’s in cages with toys that I wonder if they can even chew through. I originally bought Nico toys with the harder woods meant for Amazon parrots. They went untouched. Yet I had a conure who was shredding toys consistently, and it would take a few weeks to get through an Amazon toy. My conure can break open an almond. My Ekkie really struggles with any nut. He’ll try to open them for a few minutes before giving up. Yes, eventually I did start to try softer toys, and cracking open the nuts. It wasn’t an immediate thought though. Ekkie’s are a strange bird to work with when you do work with multiple species.