Clipping Parrots Becoming Obsolete?

[Michael]

I have been thinking about the origins of parrot clipping and realized that it is a practice carried over from wild caught parrots. Now that I think of it this way, it makes a lot more sense to me now. Perhaps the whole “crashing into windows,” “flying into walls,” and “being a danger to itself” from flying issues really stemmed from wild caught parrots being brought into captive situations. They had never seen a window, walls, etc and would try to fly as they did in the wild so these naturally became threats. Furthermore, having been wild caught they would obviously want to have nothing to do with humans and always try to fly away so clipping was almost unavoidable in order to suppress the instinctual flight response. Naturally these wild parrots would be super scared of humans and always try to get away so taming may have otherwise been impossible (I am speculating as I have never worked with a wild caught but from things I've read it seems likely).

Many “reputable” stores and breeders were originally established on the wild parrot business but moved more over to the breeding/weening since the ban. They maintain the initial school of thought that parrots must be clipped for their own safety and taming. You see, I've been thinking for a while now that there's something fishy about all the books and stores being incredibly anti-flight but under this hypothesis I think it makes more sense. These people learned about parrot handling on wild caught parrots and that was the way of dealing with them. Even if the books have been written since the ban, many of them are just newer editions or written by those same people so I think that archaic wild caught school of thought persists. I think this is why when I speak to old time bird store employees they think I'm crazy for having a flighted parrot. On the other side I had trouble understanding why they were so anti-flight but I think it is because they have not experienced flying hand fed babies.

I think many other people with hand fed parrots are coming to similar conclusions that we've been lied to about the evils of flight and that it really isn't so impossible to keep a flighted parrot. You see hand feeding isn't a lifetime guarantee of tameness but is rather a window of opportunity to be able to handle and teach the bird about our way of life early on and create routines. It is probable that it would be impossible to get close to a new flighted wild caught without it dashing away no matter what (and probably crashing into something in panic). But with the handfed babies, we have the opportunity to handle and flight train them while they are young. They learn much quicker about walls and windows and don't get too hurt if they hit them in the process.

So I am beginning to suspect that the strongly pro-clipping mindset actually stems from wild caughts and this is why it often seems to lack sense to me on our new hand fed parrots. I often find current reasons for clipping to be more so excuses than absolutely legitimate reasons (although there definitely are some). As we've analyzed in other topics, many of the same risks actually apply to clipped parrots only perhaps in varying degrees. Concerns about handle-ability and independence are solved through good training and even a clipped parrot if poorly handled will not maintain tameness either. On a case by case basis I realize that people may be unable to keep flighted parrots and it is ultimately their decision alone. However, the broadly accepted concept of clipping parrots has seemed bizarre to me, especially since one by one I've been disproving many of the misconceptions about flighted parrots for myself. Now that I've given thought to clipping keeping the old wild caught concept in mind, I think I can make more sense of the origins of the practice and reasoning. Some people still have wild caught or very old parrots to which our newer concepts may be difficult or impossible to apply. Other people are being misled by old-school books, stores, and breeders. However, for the purpose of discussion, I would like to propose that the concept of clipping newly acquired domestically hand raised baby parrots is becoming obsolete.

[bmsweb]

I would like to propose that the concept of clipping newly acquired domestically hand raised baby parrots is becoming obsolete.

If you're talking hand raised baby parrots I agree with you 100%. When our conures have babies there is no way I would even dream of clipping their wings.

From what I see in pet stores here in Australia, most of them clip wings and many seem to only clip the one wing (you need to see how one of these birds lands! Not good at all). So I don't think Clipping is going to stop any time soon.

I honestly think we need to be careful that we don't become too judgmental of people and their views. I have a friend that thinks the fact that we keep birds is cruel and should never happen. Her view is the captive bird misses out on its natural environment, possibly no mate to socialize with. Birds in the wild don't get taught to do tricks for our pleasure, they don't need their nails trimmed etc. I can turn a blind eye to this and try to justify why my pets are better off, but lets get real here. We have birds for the pleasure and joy they bring to us.

Our budgie and Cockatiel are both flighted and it brings us great pleasure to see them fly, as specially Jazz our Cockatiel who will fly to me when ever I call him, but I don't pass judgment on others based on my bias beliefs. If someone clips wings for their circumstances then that's their choice. So long as the love their bird take care of it, that's all that matters. Remember we all start somewhere!

[lzver]

I don't believe that babies should have their wings clipped. Every bird needs to be given the opportunity to learn how to fly without us interfering. That is what birds do naturally.

Jessie had a bad clip when we got him at 3 months old and because of that never really got a chance to learn how to fly. As a result of that he is not a good flyer at all. Lucy can navigate and get where she needs to go without a problem, but Jessie is constantly flying into windows and walls so I'm always worried that he'll hurt himself. Fortunately, neither one flies very often. Jessie only flies when he gets spooked and has gotten used to relying on me for being transported.

Having said that, I clip my birds every year around this time because we're at the trailer in the summer. If they do get out then they can't go very far and hopefully I have a better chance of being able to catch them.

[HyperD]

I don't think clipping will ever become obsolete. Our homes will always contain hazards that can be fixed most easily be clipping (note, not always the only solution )

Whilst leaving them flighted is on the increase, it will probably plateau and the two will be in equilibrium...