has anybody here bought a parrot from birdbreeders.com?

[Zentg]

Wild phenotype - gcc simply means that it is a normally colored Green Cheek Conure.
Shelters take in birds and quarantine them before the are allowed out into the general population of birds up for adoption and the better ones also have them checked out by a vet during their quarantine period. One should not take this to mean that they should skip the quarantine period when they bring the bird home as that could be a mistake.
As far as how long it would take to tame the bird that depends on you and the bird and what it has been through.

right on, Hey so if the normal color is the wild phenotype, then how do breeders get mutations like cinamon and pineapple? do they inject the egg with some kind of dye? why don't cinnamons exist out there in the wild?

[Navre]

All the mutations are the result of selective breeding. Some variations exist naturally, and the birds are bred to exploit them.
For years I had some white eastern grey squirrels living across the street. They were there long enough that they must have been there for multiple generations. I haven't seen them in a while. Some giant pines over there were lost in storms so maybe they're gone.

[Pajarita]

Actually, all mutations are natural in the sense that it's a defective gene that 'changes' the color or the structure of the plumage (blue been a structural color and not caused by a pigment). What breeders do is take the one bird out of hundreds that comes out different and breed it to another bird that also has the defective gene in order to get a 'line', meaning that all the birds these two will produce will have the defective gene or be split for it. In the wild, you don't see mutations because when one baby comes out different, it breeds with a 'normal' one and the mutation disappears so there are mutations that are mathematically impossible to achieve in the wild - like pineapples, for example, which are the product of two different mutations.

Wolf is correct. How long it takes to 'tame' a bird that has lost part of its bond to humans depends entirely on the bird and the new human.

Your friend doesn't know much about parrots if he thinks that he will get an IRN to be cuddly...

[seagoatdeb]

Where I live it is a 6 hour drive to the nearest rescue. There is one only half an hour away but I have not fully recovered from my visit there. I have seen quite a few rescues in my time, and they do the best they can....... but this one is awfull. They very rarely let someone adopt and it is ony to a lonely older person?????? We were informed, if we already had a bird we would not be able to adopt one.The birds were all fully flighted and stuck in cages that were far too small for the species. They all looked miserable. So many birds had plucked their feathers, two Sengals were very bare from plucking!! One mackaw was throwing himself at his cage bars. All the plucked cockatoos were desperately begging to be pet. The Afrcan greys looked so deepley depressed. The behavior of some of them looked insane. Only the odd bird had a toy of any kind. I offered to make a lot of toys and give them to them free and was informed birds just destroy toys. If they need a toy they just attach a piece of wood to a coat hanger????? The SPCA is not concerned as long as they have a cage and food and water. If I pressed the SPCA to intervene they would very likely euthanize the birds. it haunts me. It would be too expensive for me to visit sanctuarys that are a whole days drive every time I go, so I took a baby bird even though I would have gladly taken a rescue, if it had been possible for me right now.

[Wolf]

The rescue situation is a difficult one at best, but there are some of them that do a much better job of taking care of the birds in their care than the one that you describe. Unfortunately all of the rescues that I am aware of are all full up on the number of birds that they can take in and care for. The adoption situation is not much better and there are those who will adopt a bird and then resale it on craigs list of other such sites, which is not the purpose of the adoption process.

[seagoatdeb]

Well this one I was talking about very rarely adopts. They charge you to go see the parrots and say that they cant take anymore unless they come with cages. I cant understand what reason they would have to keep these poor parrots trapped in these little cages with no toys and next to no attention rather than adopt them out. When I asked if the parrots came out of the cages occasionally and were any coming out today, I was told their cage was their sanctuary and none would want to come out???????

[Wolf]

I am afraid that I would have to find a way to shut such a place down as that is hoarding and not rescuing. And being jailed in such a small space is not a life worth having.

[Pajarita]

Sounds like the person running it is a hoarder. Lots of hoarders call themselves rescuers... not that they are lying, mind you, they actually do see themselves as rescuers but, of course, they are not.

The SPCA will not put the birds down, they usually work with good rescues which take the birds they confiscate from cruelty situations (like this one) or put them up for adoption themselves (it's not like it used to be, things are changing). Have you tried calling the USDA and reporting them? Rescues usually need a license from them (it depends on the state, though) and the license requires an inspection which they would not have passed under those conditions.

But, for adopting, there are other resources, Craigslist, Kijiji and RescueMe come to mind...

[seagoatdeb]

I am in Kelowna, Canada, the SPCA here has dogs and cats and have even given some parrots to this rescue. They wont be any help, and would not be ble to care for that many birds and some would probaly be be euthanized. I am haunted by this situation.

[Pajarita]

Talk to the person in charge of this SPCA. I bet they don't know the terrible conditions the birds are kept in this rescue. Also, there has to be some kind of a government agency that monitors breeders and people who keep large numbers of animals in Canada - here and depending on exactly what you are looking for, we have two: the USDA and the Wildlife and Fish -one keeps track of conditions, diseases, etc and the other one issues licenses for exotics.