Sep 01 2008
Grey Parrot Breeder Or Grey Parrot Rescuer?
Grey Parrot Photo by Dominic Morel
African Grey parrots are incredibly charismatic birds and companions. Their intelligence has been likened that of a five year old child. They aren’t as big as a Macaw and seem to be hardier. And there are certainly a lot of African Greys and African Grey parrot breeders about. There are enough in the captive population that importing any more from the wild is not only illegal, but unnecessary. So, should you get your parrot from a Grey parrot breeder or a Grey parrot rescuer?
Advantages Of Young Birds
Grey parrot breeders often sell only young birds, some even less than a year old. Younger birds often can be quicker to tame and bond with another person than an older bird. Another advantage of getting your feathered friend from a Grey parrot breeder is that they are able to give you the entire history of your new friend, as well as the history of the parents. This can help with health and training problems.
One glaring difference in getting a bird from Grey parrot breeders is that they often know more about parrots than all of the area veterinarians put together. This is only with experienced Grey parrot breeders, especially ones who also do parrot rescue. They have more hands-on experience than animal shelters, which are generally geared for cats, dogs and small pet rodents.
Advantages Of Rescue Birds
Really good animal or bird rescues will give your home a once-over and ask for a reference letter from your vet in order before they will let you adopt a bird. They don’t want to see the parrot back into the shelter system, which is harder on birds than mammals. When you adopt an adult Grey parrot, you already know how big he’ll get.
If you have other birds, you will need to quarantine your rescued African Grey for at least one month. This means keeping the bird in another room entirely and washing your hands between handling birds. You also will likely have to take the rescued bird to the vet, although many animal rescues will try their best to put only healthy animals up for adoption.
Another advantage of adopting an African Grey rather than buying from a Grey parrot breeder is that you pay a lot less for the bird. Yo still have to pay an adoption fee sometimes in the three digits, but it is still a fraction of what a baby African Grey would cost.
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We have a re-homed Grey. She came to us directly from her first home at age 10. We have had her for a year and she is a delight! She hadn’t been to the vet in years so we took her right away for a wellness check–she was fine. She is an on-and-off plucker, unfortunately by the time we got her an intractable problem, and she’s not much of a talker. She favors electronic beeps and whistles and she has a pretty good repertoire of those! She was not only cheaper than a baby bird, she was “free,” by which I mean we only had to spend about a grand equipping her. She came with her own cage, but unfortunately it fell off the truck on moving day and we had to buy another. And she was not on a premium food, so although she came with some, there was another expense. She also came with toys, but they were all hard plastic as that’s all she wouldn’t destroy (!). So we stopped off at the bird store and spent a small fortune on things she can chew and shred. So your readers should keep in mind that an adopted bird, even one that comes with “everything” is going to cost a good bit before it’s settled in.