Things Our Parrots Say

Cindylynn

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So it's a quiet night here. Kids are out enjoying the beautiful spring weather, hubby is out fishing, I'm here cooking supper for when everyone comes in. Pancho is talking to me while I'm cooking and says, clear as a bell, "Come 'ere. I'm a good boy."
I know folks think they just chatter and repeat, but there are times I KNOW that Pancho knows and means what he is saying! I'd love to hear other folks stories of their birds knowing exactly what they are talking about!
 
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Cottonoid

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I have a temporary foster who speaks in a very clear adult human cis-male-sounding voice. He says a lot of things in context that blow my mind. One of the funniest was the first time he accidentally met my Quaker - I wasn't expecting my bird to fly into the room, and he landed on my quickly raised hand. The foster was on my shoulder and hadn't been too keen on anybody else being near me - he puffed his feathers up and popped forward toward my Quaker, saying "hellooooo" and my Quaker, startled, stumbled off my hand then flew away.

The foster cocked his head, looked at my Quaker, and said "what're you doing down there *hehehehehe* " 🤣😂🤣

It was so sinister and SO funny and I know my words aren't accurately conveying the tone but holy cow this foster bird 100% knows the context.

He also tells me I'm a pretty bird so can't argue with that 😂
 

texsize

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2 GCA(Luna,Merlin) The Twins
1 Congo AG (Bella)
5 Cockatiels
The two biggest talkers are Bella and Bingo.

Bella is amazing because she makes up her own words and phrases.

Prella = pretty and Bella.
Shella = shower and Bella.
Once she bit me and said “it’s ok”
I taught her to say ”red butt shower” and she learned it well.
she knows what it means but uses it like a lock pick to get me to let her out of her cage.
She also modified the phrase.
red butt Bingo.
red butt kiss.
red butt sweet bird.

Bingo calls my wife’s name when he wants her to give him food from my wife’s plat.
He says “flowers “ when my wife is making flower arrangements.
 

zERo

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Tony my Quaker is pretty much the only one that talks.
Some of the things he says are only sparked by certain situations.
For instance he sneezes when I do, his way of saying bless you, lol!
He says Give me kiss, Good bird, good boy, good girl (his previous owners thought he was a female)
He also says baby bird, does an evil laugh, and clicks his tongue when it do.
The thing he says in somewhat accurate context the most often is ‘It’s okay’ when something scary happened!
He says ‘Stop it! When he knows I’m getting upset, or ‘bad’
Recently, yesterday, I taught him, ahem ‘idiots’ yelling it a family 😅

Tom the GCC has tried to talk, he’s said I love you a few times and his most frequent word, ‘Birdie!’
 

foxgloveparrot

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Cricket (pacific parrotlet)
Snowberry is the only talker, and even she doesn't say much. Just "Snow!", "Jazzy Jaz", and "Bird" so far. She picked up on all of them INSANELY fast (except Bird, which her previous owner taught her I believe)
 
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Cindylynn

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The two biggest talkers are Bella and Bingo.

Bella is amazing because she makes up her own words and phrases.

Prella = pretty and Bella.
Shella = shower and Bella.
Once she bit me and said “it’s ok”
I taught her to say ”red butt shower” and she learned it well.
she knows what it means but uses it like a lock pick to get me to let her out of her cage.
She also modified the phrase.
red butt Bingo.
red butt kiss.
red butt sweet bird.

Bingo calls my wife’s name when he wants her to give him food from my wife’s plat.
He says “flowers “ when my wife is making flower arrangements.
It blows my mind when Pancho puts together coherent phrases like that! Bella sounds like a super smart birdie!!
 
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Cindylynn

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I have a temporary foster who speaks in a very clear adult human cis-male-sounding voice. He says a lot of things in context that blow my mind. One of the funniest was the first time he accidentally met my Quaker - I wasn't expecting my bird to fly into the room, and he landed on my quickly raised hand. The foster was on my shoulder and hadn't been too keen on anybody else being near me - he puffed his feathers up and popped forward toward my Quaker, saying "hellooooo" and my Quaker, startled, stumbled off my hand then flew away.

The foster cocked his head, looked at my Quaker, and said "what're you doing down there *hehehehehe* " 🤣😂🤣

It was so sinister and SO funny and I know my words aren't accurately conveying the tone but holy cow this foster bird 100% knows the context.

He also tells me I'm a pretty bird so can't argue with that 😂
Your foster sounds like a character! I hope he finds a forever home that can keep up with that level of intelligence!
 
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Cindylynn

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Tony my Quaker is pretty much the only one that talks.
Some of the things he says are only sparked by certain situations.
For instance he sneezes when I do, his way of saying bless you, lol!
He says Give me kiss, Good bird, good boy, good girl (his previous owners thought he was a female)
He also says baby bird, does an evil laugh, and clicks his tongue when it do.
The thing he says in somewhat accurate context the most often is ‘It’s okay’ when something scary happened!
He says ‘Stop it! When he knows I’m getting upset, or ‘bad’
Recently, yesterday, I taught him, ahem ‘idiots’ yelling it a family 😅

Tom the GCC has tried to talk, he’s said I love you a few times and his most frequent word, ‘Birdie!’
Smart little fella!!
 

DonnaBudgie

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Jan 24, 2023
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Budgies. Lotsa Budgies.
Tony my Quaker is pretty much the only one that talks.
Some of the things he says are only sparked by certain situations.
For instance he sneezes when I do, his way of saying bless you, lol!
He says Give me kiss, Good bird, good boy, good girl (his previous owners thought he was a female)
He also says baby bird, does an evil laugh, and clicks his tongue when it do.
The thing he says in somewhat accurate context the most often is ‘It’s okay’ when something scary happened!
He says ‘Stop it! When he knows I’m getting upset, or ‘bad’
Recently, yesterday, I taught him, ahem ‘idiots’ yelling it a family 😅

Tom the GCC has tried to talk, he’s said I love you a few times and his most frequent word, ‘Birdie!’
I had a budgie who said "Who's your buddy" and "Birds can't talk"! He was such a smart little guy.
 

onamom

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For Ona it’s mostly still just “step up”. She says it when I call her name in the morning, when you hold your finger out, and when she wants to be on you…. Which is all the time really. She also says it to protest when I cover her sleep cage at night. She can say “goodnight” at bed time but doesn’t very often.
 

Botsari

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Nov 1, 2022
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African Greys
Just a couple from my Greys over the years. They have a really huge, ever changing, set of thing they say, but there are a few things that have become stories…

- The very first thing my TAG ever said when he was about 10 months old, the better part of three decades ago, was “wanna purple grape”. The weird thing is this will somehow pop out of him unprompted all these years later. As I’m writing this he is imitating the local Stellar’s Jays - perfectly. It is spring, and nesting season, and the Jays are starting to make a huge racket outside.

- Another early thing both my birds learned was to imitate the beeping sound some of the trucks made backing up outside, as well as the sirens. These started off as perfect imitations, but over the years they have been combined and riffed on endlessly until they have become a whole repertoire of rising, falling and ululating whistles that are still recognizable, but also unique creations that don’t exist in the real world in those forms.

-Years ago I had a friend/collaborator visit me and stayed at my house over part of the summer while we finished up some scientific papers we were writing together. My bedroom was upstairs, and the (analog) phone was downstairs as was the guest room. Very occasionally, probably not more than half a dozen times while he was visiting the phone rang, my friend answered it, and then called up to me “Marko, phone call”. Of course I came running downstairs which my birds picked up on right away. Within a few days sure enough they were doing - in a perfect imitation of my friend’s voice - “Marko, phone call” that had me also running. It really happened only a few times for real, but hundreds of times by the birds over the next several years - still in my friends voice.

- On this phone theme, when I still had an analog phone and it was pretty near their room they would of course do a perfect imitation of the phone ringing to try to get me to come running. But they also did a perfect imitation of me saying a hello when I answered. When they really got going in tandem, which was quite often, one of them would make the phone ringing noise and the other would then say “hello” in my voice. Then they would switch roles with the other bird making the phone ring to start things off - back and forth. It was hilarious and sounded like my parrots gently mocking their human and his bizarre preoccupations.

- Last one. Parrots are of course very good with contextual association. For example they always say “good night birds” when I turn off their light at their bedtime. I often listen to the news on the radio (nowadays it is digitally) in the kitchen in sight of my birds - usually NPR. Sometimes the birds are physically in my kitchen with me just hanging out. They have learned to turn on the radio station on my Amazon echo By saying “Alexa, play news!” It was a bit creepy the first time hearing Alexa respond to someone in the next room as I hadn’t heard them speak. When I‘m going to be out of the house after their bedtime I will sometimes unplug the device so they don’t accidentally turn it on and keep themselves awake. Unfortunately they have not learned how to turn it off when they are done listening…yet.

Anyway … In in the past, oh let’s say six plus years to pick a random number, a certain politician who will remain unnamed has been on the news a lot, very often saying what are - to my ears at least - incredibly stupid/nasty/ignorant/mendacious things. I developed what I have come to call “***** Tourette’s“ - eventually I started cursing whenever I heard the sound of his voice, even when he was only nattering about something that, by his standards, was not very offensive - it became a true Pavlovian response. Well, of course the birds rapidly pick up anything that is dramatic and exciting - and that includes curses. But they also picked up the habit of interjecting curse words at random every so often, but only when the news was playing! That also eventually began to sound like my birds gently mocking my silly human preoccupations!
 
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wrench13

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Salty says a bunch of things, but I think his favorite is to say his name in different ways, Hard to convey in text form, sometimes sweetly, sometimes slow and stretching out the 'ay' like Saltaaaaaaay. Some times he adds his evil laugh at the end. But most of what he says he learned from videos of ringnecks; he loves to watch and listen to them. He usually asks them "Are you a bird? A pretty bird?", you can hear the question mark in his inflection. He calls for me, "Daddy!" when he wants me. His chatty time is in the mornings, after he has breakfast and having his late lunch around 2 or so. THats when he practices saying stuff, old and new.
 
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Cindylynn

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Just a couple from my Greys over the years. They have a really huge, ever changing, set of thing they say, but there are a few things that have become stories…

- The very first thing my TAG ever said when he was about 10 months old, the better part of three decades ago, was “wanna purple grape”. The weird thing is this will somehow pop out of him unprompted all these years later. As I’m writing this he is imitating the local Stellar’s Jays - perfectly. It is spring, and nesting season, and the Jays are starting to make a huge racket outside.

- Another early thing both my birds learned was to imitate the beeping sound some of the trucks made backing up outside, as well as the sirens. These started off as perfect imitations, but over the years they have been combined and riffed on endlessly until they have become a whole repertoire of rising, falling and ululating whistles that are still recognizable, but also unique creations that don’t exist in the real world in those forms.

-Years ago I had a friend/collaborator visit me and stayed at my house over part of the summer while we finished up some scientific papers we were writing together. My bedroom was upstairs, and the (analog) phone was downstairs as was the guest room. Very occasionally, probably not more than half a dozen times while he was visiting the phone rang, my friend answered it, and then called up to me “Marko, phone call”. Of course I came running downstairs which my birds picked up on right away. Within a few days sure enough they were doing - in a perfect imitation of my friend’s voice - “Marko, phone call” that had me also running. It really happened only a few times for real, but hundreds of times by the birds over the next several years - still in my friends voice.

- On this phone theme, when I still had an analog phone and it was pretty near their room they would of course do a perfect imitation of the phone ringing to try to get me to come running. But they also did a perfect imitation of me saying a hello when I answered. When they really got going in tandem, which was quite often, one of them would make the phone ringing noise and the other would then say “hello” in my voice. Then they would switch roles with the other bird making the phone ring to start things off - back and forth. It was hilarious and sounded like my parrots gently mocking their human and his bizarre preoccupations.

- Last one. Parrots are of course very good with contextual association. For example they always say “good night birds” when I turn off their light at their bedtime. I often listen to the news on the radio (nowadays it is digitally) in the kitchen in sight of my birds - usually NPR. Sometimes the birds are physically in my kitchen with me just hanging out. They have learned to turn on the radio station on my Amazon echo By saying “Alexa, play news!” It was a bit creepy the first time hearing Alexa respond to someone in the next room as I hadn’t heard them speak. When I‘m going to be out of the house after their bedtime I will sometimes unplug the device so they don’t accidentally turn it on and keep themselves awake. Unfortunately they have not learned how to turn it off when they are done listening…yet.

Anyway … In in the past, oh let’s say six plus years to pick a random number, a certain politician who will remain unnamed has been on the news a lot, very often saying what are - to my ears at least - incredibly stupid/nasty/ignorant/mendacious things. I developed what I have come to call “***** Tourette’s“ - eventually I started cursing whenever I heard the sound of his voice, even when he was only nattering about something that, by his standards, was not very offensive - it became a true Pavlovian response. Well, of course the birds rapidly pick up anything that is dramatic and exciting - and that includes curses. But they also picked up the habit of interjecting curse words at random every so often, but only when the news was playing! That eventually began to sound like my bird gently mocking my silly human preoccupations!

Salty says a bunch of things, but I think his favorite is to say his name in different ways, Hard to convey in text form, sometimes sweetly, sometimes slow and stretching out the 'ay' like Saltaaaaaaay. Some times he adds his evil laugh at the end. But most of what he says he learned from videos of ringnecks; he loves to watch and listen to them. He usually asks them "Are you a bird? A pretty bird?", you can hear the question mark in his inflection. He calls for me, "Daddy!" when he wants me. His chatty time is in the mornings, after he has breakfast and having his late lunch around 2 or so. THats when he practices saying stuff, old and new.
It's so funny when they practice their words!!!
 

Botsari

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Nov 1, 2022
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It's so funny when they practice their words!!!

This is one of the reasons I knew my TAG needed a new friend - my two greys used to go off nonstop riffing with each other for a couple of hours every morning. When Sophie was suddenly gone he didn't make much noise unless I was nearby. But I have really noticed the past few days he has gotten quite vocal again in the morning which I interpret as interacting with "the kid". The kid makes some random noises, but still hasn't really started heavily experimenting yet - but he listens, and my TAG sees him listening. It is going to be interesting once his vocalization switch turns on in a few months. When the house is a riot of sound in the morning again we both will hopefully have gone some way towards recovering from the loss of Sophie.
 
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Rico_Tiel

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well rico only knows peekaboo and how to laugh and istg he laughs in the right context. if someone does something really goofy he laughs or if I laugh at something he laughs. if we play peekaboo, he gets it and can do it for hours.
 

Botsari

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I had high hopes of toilet training when I first got Pancho. So every time I saw him poop, I'd say "poop". That plan backfired on me. Now my bird announces "poop" when he poops!


:ROFLMAO:

Parrots don't respond much to any kind of negative reinforcement, and I have noticed this myself many times - ANY kind of reaction is just as likely to be internalized by the bird as "applause", sometimes with amusing (especially when viewed from the outside) results.
 

MomofMango

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May 20, 2022
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Scarlet Macaw, Mango
Mango says a few things...
"Hey Mango, hey buddy, big bird, hello, how are you, here, want a cookie?, jeffrey"... he also yells at two of the dogs saying "darla" and "alfie". He will give you a kiss if you ask him for one. He recently "aah aah"d me when I was doing something he didn't appreciate.

He answers the phone if he hears it ring.
Sometimes I catch him muttering things to his toys. I'm still trying to teach him lots of things. I've always found the more you communicate with animals, the more they can communicate with you.

I had high hopes of toilet training when I first got Pancho. So every time I saw him poop, I'd say "poop". That plan backfired on me. Now my bird announces "poop" when he poops!
This is hilarious. I often ask Mango if he has to poop when I pick him up so he'll go before I carry him around. I think I should stop hahaha.
 

Jcas

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Quaker, 2 budgies
I've only had my Quaker, JJ, for about four months but he is 15 ish years old so he came with a lot of phrases already learned. (As I'm typing, he keeps clicking his beak and saying "come in!") His favorite is, "What are you doing?" and he totally understands what that means! He also likes to say "meow! Kitty Kitty! Kitty!" even though he's never lived with a cat in his life. He does this funny, wheezing laugh that cracks me up anytime I hear it (and he knows it; he does it when he knows I'm annoyed with him because I can't help but start laughing). A few weeks ago JJ was in a screaming phase and I was trying to get some work done around the house. I tried to ignore him but eventually it was driving me nuts so I went into his room, tapped his cage and told him he needed to stop screaming. He gave me that "look" that birds get when they're about to do something outrageous and then said "Stop it," clear as a bell, followed by that wheezy laugh. Never heard him say that before or since. I had to flee the room before I busted out laughing and rewarded him for being so sassy lol. I think a lot of times they know exactly what they're saying!
 

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