Basic Bird Care - What is a Parrot

Hi, I am Susan Vandenbroek for FeatherHeads in Sterling Virginia. We are a bird store. We have over 6500 sq. feet of birds cages toys food and supplies to keep your feathered friends happy. Not only do we have a large staff of feathered consultants, but we also have some people who are very knowledgeable with birds. Adeen (ph) who has been with us almost since we opened years ago, is herself a bird owner, has about 20 birds of her own, many different types and can help you choose different things for different birds. Then Rob, our new Certified Avian Specialist and his friend Zowie (ph). Today we are going to be talking about caring for your parrot. We are going to cover such topics as purchasing a cage, outfitting your cage, how to choose food, how to choose toys, what type of purchase you need to use, when you need a Vet emergency care for your bird, wing clipping, but before we get started with our individual topics, lets talk a little bit about what a parrot is? A parrot is part of the order of Psittaciformes. There are two families that make up the order, Cacatuidae which is the cockatoos and the Psittacidae, which is all your other parrots. Most people are most familiar with the Macaws and thats what most people consider a parrot, but all of the birds that you are looking at here are actually parrots, from the very tiniest little parrot left, to the very largest of the Macaws the Hyacinth Macaw. Parrots come from all over the warm parts of the world, North America, South America, Africa, India, South East Asia, South America, Central America and Australasia. Most of the parrots in the world come from the Australasia, South America and Central America areas. We are going to talk about some of the different types. This is an Eclectus, he is from the Australia area. Eclectus are one of the few that are sexually dimorphic, which means the male and female looked totally different. Most parrots, that is not true of most parrots, are very similar, there are very little differences between the sexes. Parrots are also characterized by the fact that they are zygodactyls, which means they have four toes, two, with face front and two which face back. Parrots are also Alrticial, which means when they give birth to their young, they are totally dependent on their parents for care. This bird went from this egg to this size in two-and-a-half weeks. Now that we have identified for you what a parrot is, we are going to talk about a cage for your parrot.