Odd things your bird does...

[WolfmoonCT]

Ok.. so.. Ever since we've gotten Leo, one of the strangest things he does, is while he eats pellets, he feels the need to dip them into water before he eats them. He'll do the same thing to the corn in seed mixes.

Makes for a messy water bowl. I usually have to change it 4-5 times a day cause you look at it, and there is pellet pieces and crumbs all through it.

It is pretty funny though, when he's eating seeds and he's dipping his beak in the water, then sorting through the seeds and he comes up and all the broken sunflower shells and small broken seed pieces are all over it.. It's so funny looking.

 

[Auggie's Dad]

Most, if not all, parrots do this.

I've taken a few measures so I can get away with changing Auggies water only once or twice a day. First I moved his water dish to the other side of the cage from his food. He still dips, but he has to hike back and forth to dip and eat one piece of food at a time. When the two dishes were close he'd just take dozens of pieces of food, throw them in the water, then decide which ones to eat, usually leaving much more muck in the water dish.

Also I have a two lick-bottles for him (gerbil style water bottles). This way he always has access to clean water even if he makes soup in his water dish.

If you do go this route you may see something else crazy: Birds have to learn how to use the lick-bottles if they haven't before. When I first gave Auggie one he walked right up to it, looked at me, looked at the bottle, looked at me, then stuck his beak in it and drained all the water onto the floor. He had a very proud look after that.

 

[WolfmoonCT]

Leo has a water bottle. But when I'm not at home, he really doesn't eat anything. When I get home, and start eating supper, he'll sit and eat non stop for like a half hour, eating like a half cup of pellets, and a quarter cup of seed mix. Of course that half cup of pellets half of it ends up back in the bowl or on the floor. LOL

When I get home, I usually bring him into the bedroom with me where my PC is and he gets to go on his gymset. There is no way to put a water bottle on his gymset.

I figure if he's hungry during the day he'll eat. That is one thing I don't worry about usually.. cause soon as he gets on his gymset he'll pig out.

 

[antoinette]

Odd thing Mishka, my African Grey does........ after eating her veggies or fresh fruit, she sits on her playpen, then grabs a chain that hangs from the top
AND SUCKS ON IT LIKE A DUMMY......
Been doing that since very young.
WHO SAID THEY ARE NOT HUMAN ??????

 

[norenekay]

Well, I can't find the topic of not eating the purple pellets, but wanted to share that I hadn't noticed before but my grey, Corky, eats them first. LOL

 

[Prophecy]

Though not a AG, My jenday ''dunks'' his pellets in his water dish as well.He also waits to eat with us.His cage is in our dining room,and when we sit down to a meal,he chats with us and eats his food while we eat ours.lol.

 

[parrotqueen]

One of my cockatiels, named Sunshine, will make random squeaking and chattering noises when he plays with his favorite toy. I don't know where he picked it up from, but he clearly shouts, "EUREKA!!" when he plays. Maybe his first owner taught him that?

The other bird, named Pineapple, likes to talk with his mouth full of veggies and seeds. He makes a strange noise that sounds exactly like a guinea pig squeaking/chattering.

And they both do this; they will sing a sort of 'Opera' styled song, and dunk their beak in the water to make it echo and bubble. They love the sound it makes.

 

[yuko]

Ok.. so.. Ever since we've gotten Leo, one of the strangest things he does, is while he eats pellets, he feels the need to dip them into water before he eats them. He'll do the same thing to the corn in seed mixes.

Makes for a messy water bowl. I usually have to change it 4-5 times a day cause you look at it, and there is pellet pieces and crumbs all through it.

It is pretty funny though, when he's eating seeds and he's dipping his beak in the water, then sorting through the seeds and he comes up and all the broken sunflower shells and small broken seed pieces are all over it.. It's so funny looking.

My bird used to drink while he ate and he drank from a bowl so he woudl do that same thing, having seeds all over his beak. But now he has a small hamster/gerbil drink bottle where you push it with the toungue and the water comes out to prevent him from doing that. He eats during the day but also enjoys eating while we eat

 

[Caitnah]

I built my CAG a really nice playground along side his cage AND on top of his cage. Cost me a bit of $$.

When I let him out, do you think he'll go to his playground? NOPE...he climbs down to the floor to play with the cage wheel.

 

[ChristaNL]

After eating something utterly disgusting like fresh fruit or (the horror) vegetables, even it's been only a sip of juice ....

one simply MUST climb around and gather a beak full of cardboard and chew on that to get rid of the awfull taste!


(Life according to Japie)

 

[AmyMyBlueFront]

BB eats fruity pellets. He must be dunking too coz his water turns yellow/red and needs changing at least twice a day




Jim

 

[Sunnyclover]

BB eats fruity pellets. He must be dunking too coz his water turns yellow/red and needs changing at least twice a day




Jim

Jim I wish I only had to change my boys' water twice a day...try 6 times! They both dip their fruity and veggie pellets and the veggie ones are quite large. Finley does this great thing where as I'm getting new water and washing the water bowl he gets a huge green veggies stick looking pellet in his mouth and sits by the water dish spot and AS I'm putting the water dish in his cage he drops the giant pellet in it and then leaves to go do something else in his cage. I'm like COME ON! Lol.

 

[DRB]

MY Perjo doesn't dunk anything that I am aware of, odd thing she does? Isn't everything they do odd considering they are wild parrots living in our domesticated homes? Lol.

 

[DiscoDuck]

Pictures are worth a thousand words..

 

[bigfellasdad]

Ok.. so.. Ever since we've gotten Leo, one of the strangest things he does, is while he eats pellets, he feels the need to dip them into water before he eats them. He'll do the same thing to the corn in seed mixes.

Makes for a messy water bowl. I usually have to change it 4-5 times a day cause you look at it, and there is pellet pieces and crumbs all through it.

It is pretty funny though, when he's eating seeds and he's dipping his beak in the water, then sorting through the seeds and he comes up and all the broken sunflower shells and small broken seed pieces are all over it.. It's so funny looking.

Enzo does this with pellets, or indeed anything thats dry. She is either trying to soften her food up or make a tasty parrot soup.

Some strange things Enzo does.

Flies to open draws and go to the far end of them and start chewing/scratching anything she finds.

She also purrs like a cat when she cuddles in to me, ive never had a bird that does that.

 

[ChristaNL]

Climbing into drawers (dark cavelike spaces) and scratching is nesting behaviour.


The greys here are forever trying to find places to do that too.
(Its that time of the year ... again)


=


Sunny makes the weirdest fast clickingsound with the tongue sometimes when is is *really* enjoying her scritches (on her head, around the ears, ceres and her beak).
I hope it is just contentment, but judging how not-normal she behaves otherwise its probably something partner/pairbonding-ish?


It reminds me of the way storks will greet each other

[ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WNDItSd-Jzc"]Ooievaars klepperen. - YouTube[/ame]

 

[bigfellasdad]

Climbing into drawers (dark cavelike spaces) and scratching is nesting behaviour.


The greys here are forever trying to find places to do that too.
(Its that time of the year ... again)

OK, i wasnt sure. time for some more training as a distraction then.

Sunny makes the weirdest fast clickingsound with the tongue sometimes when is is *really* enjoying her scritches (on her head, around the ears, ceres and her beak).
I hope it is just contentment, but judging how not-normal she behaves otherwise its probably something partner/pairbonding-ish?

Enzo does this too, I think its a greating thing, she will do it against familiar objects she likes and often she will act submissive for a few seconds. She sometimes does this to my ear when she lands on my shoulder if i have been out of sight for a while.

 

[thegars]

Debbie, our 21 month old CAG is also a “dunker”...she also has this crazy tendency to hang from her toys or cage bars, and reach back with her foot and pull her tail feathers and scream like someone is killing her....then gets on her perch and says WOOOO...NO BITE....lol...drives me crazy but she doesn’t yank on them just pulls....or sticks her tail out through the cage bars while doing a “back bend” screaming cause something’s got her tail! Trying to ignore her screams so she doesn’t do it for attention....

 

[Scott]

Gabby (Goffins) has an odd OCD style of eating some foods. With chop, he'll often hold one item he does not eat, usually an edamame pod or lima bean, than grasp an item he intends to eat. He will then alternate between eating a piece of the desired food, swallow, gently beak the unwanted item, and repeat. Once the "good" food is consumed, or he's had enough, the other item is dropped.

 

[ChristaNL]

LOL, after a months long struggle to get Sunny to understand that macademia-nuts are edible and actually pretty good ... she completely surprised me yesterday!

I gave one each to the greys as a bedtime treat (they came back in the cage very nicely etc.) so they earned it and of course she got a bit jealous/impatient because hers took a bit longer to arrive.
(accidentaly on purpose of course, sometimes I am a cruel and manipulative person - ask any parrot!)

I try to get her to sit on her perch when I give her snacks- some training but also it makes it easier for me to read her bodylanguage.

In the beginning she would just as happily lunge at (and latch on) my fingers as accept a treat... so the human learns
She progressed to just knocking things out of my fingers (and still sometimes get a chomp in) to just acepting stuff nicely and gently (when it suits her).
so... its getting there slowly to the point I do not count all my fingers after every single interaction with her.

So...when she would not sit on a perch but kept hanging on the bars, death-staring at me, I was not completely comfortable, guessing about her intentions - but gave her the nut anyway. (A promise is a promise.)

She took it eagerly and almost ran of with it, positioned herself upside down above her foodbowl and head down split the nut in two! One half was gently put inside the bowl (for safekeeping) the onther one got munched oh-so slowly with great enjoyment.

So not only had the nut gone from "possibly poison - and I *know* you want to kill me!" to "okay, yea, food, whatever" but it somehow got upgraded to "best treasured treat of all the world!".

She showed me a new trick!/ Good thinking. :03:

So far she only threw stuff *out* of the bowl, never put something in it!
(and she never retrieves anything from the cagefloor)