New User Kris

[kme3388]

Hi everyone, I’m Kris. I decided to join this chat room as we owners of parrots have a common denominator. We all love our parrots, and can’t be without them.

I currently have a Jenday Conure named Kiwi. I’ve had Kiwi for over 10 years. As all of us conure owners know they are loud, and can be little monsters. I however absolutely adore conures, and their energy. They are so fun to train, and play with. My conure is a chainsaw on legs, and goes through a ton of toys.

I recently about 3 months ago adopted an Eclectus parrot named Nico. I volunteered at the shelter, and just fell in love with him. He’s very quiet, and docile. He’s the complete opposite of my conure. He moves like a sloth, and hates mornings. He likes a more quiet environment. Nico is a lover, and just likes to be held. He isn’t a chewer like my conure.

Please drop by and say hi, and tell me about your parrots!!! I love to learn about them. They have so much personality.

[Pajarita]

Hi, Kris, Kiwi and Nico! Welcome to the forum and thank you for adopting Nico. I wish I could tell you about my parrots but, in truth, I have too many to write about each of them but I can tell you that I also love conures and, for some particular reason, there is only one that is noisy, the others are all 'normal' parrots (they vocalize but not loud or frequently). I have two GCCs (both females), a Nanday (male), three quakers (which, although they are sui generis are also conures - two males and one female) and a blue crown (male and the only one that can be a pain in the neck with the screams but he is still fairly new so I am hoping he will calm down as his endocrine system finally goes back to be in tune with the seasons -most birds scream because they are overly hormonal).

Now, if I may give you a bit of advice: please note that ekkies cannot eat what the industry calls 'parrot diets' so no seeds, no pellets for them (a couple of nuts a day is the most they should get) and very little veggies high in salycilates (they tend to have an intolerance to them). The truth is that these parrots should have never been bred for human pets because both their social grouping and their diet are way too specialized and cannot be reproduced in captivity - and that's why they have such very short lives in captivity and all of them end up with severe liver issues. I don't know how old Nico is but, if over 5 years, you should consider putting him on liver tonics/cleansers on a regular basis.

[kme3388]

Thank you for the warm welcome. You do have a lot of parrots. Conures too I just adore conures. Nanday's are larger aren't they? Do they flock call as well like the Jenday's, and suns? Yeah, they are loud. It doesn't bother me though. I have been very confused about Nico my eclectus parrot. I've read so many differnt things online that I'm just confused about their diet. Nico does have feather plucking issues, and he's disabled as he has a broken wing. He's such a cutie though. He's always wanting to be held, and really enjoys being around people. I have him out pretty much all day. He only goes in his cage at night. He is working with a vet because he does have health issues. I just follow the diet that the vet recommended. I know she mentioned the diet she put him on is for easier digestion. I'm learning fairly quickly that the ekkies really do have a lot of health issues.

[Pajarita]

Well, I don't know if I would say that they have 'a lot' of health issues... In my personal experience (not much because I only had one male -Redsided- and one female -Solomon Islands) and for what I have read and found out about other ekkies, the health issues are almost all related to bad diet and bad light schedule. The bad diet messes up their livers and kidneys but it also ends up giving them cardiovascular issues - and the bad light schedule makes them overly hormonal very easily because they are naturally very high hormonal birds (they have a breeding season that can last up to nine months at a time). Of course, the bad diet also contributes to the hormone production so you end up with a bird that ends up with all kinds of problems. These birds should have never ever been bred for the pet trade - we give them lives of misery and kill them way too young. I don't know if you have heard of Laurella Desborough but she was one of the very first ekkie breeders and promoters in USA and the rescue world used to call her 'Cruella' Desborough for her part in it.

And, yes, it is very common for ekkies to pluck - again, bad diet and bad light schedule plus the fact that their social structure is completely different from all other parrots (several males for one female in the nest and flocks made of the same gender: males with males and females with females) which is almost impossible to reproduce under pet conditions.

I would suggest you do some in-depth research on their natural diet and do not take an avian vet's word for it because they do not study parrot nutrition. Avian Medicine text books have a very small chapter on avian nutrition and it covers from chickens to canaries to eagles to vultures to hummingbirds so saying it gives VERY general information is a huge understatement. But, even if they did study parrot nutrition, you could not apply it to ekkies because their diet is different same as a lorikeet's diet is different. Ekkies have the longest intestinal tract of all the parrots which tells us that they eat very little protein because the shorter the intestinal tract, the more protein the animal eats - that's why cats have very short ones and cows have several stomachs plus loooong intestines. You need a lot of 'absorbing' area for the body to use plant material as food because of the large amount of fiber while meat -high protein- has none. The other important fact about long intestines = high fiber plant material diet is the water content. Plant material has an average of 85 to 95% water content while pellets are max 10% and seeds/nuts are about 12% and we have learned that changing the average moisture content in a diet for an animal has consequences in the long term because the animal lives with a subclinical dehydration that, in time, affects the kidneys (we learned this with cats and our feeding them dry kibble).

So do your research but scientific research, not just asking other people who most likely did not do any research either. There aren't many studies done on parrots diets but reading field biologists reports and researching the nutritional value of the plants they eat in their natural habitat gives you a pretty good idea. Oh, one more thing, ekkies do not do well with rich diet, they do much better with what we would consider a poor diet so don't fill him up with vitamins and minerals - a little goes a long way for them.

When I had ekkies, I fed them gloop and raw produce with just a couple of nuts like cashews or pistachios for dinner and had them on liver/kidney cleaners/tonics all the time. Romeo, the male, also plucked something terrible (and he was super mean, too) and although he did not stop completely, he did get A LOT better (he was sent to an ekkie sanctuary when I closed my rescue).

[kme3388]

Thank you for your help. I do appreciate it. Nico turns all pellets into dust. He grinds all pellets up, and then he puts it in his water. Then drinks the water like that. He does eat most veggies, or anything put in front of him. He was a picky eater when I first got him. I only use nuts as forging toys. Nutriberries are his treats. I’ve heard that Ekkie’s can be aggressive especially the females. Nico is the only Ekkie I’ve met in person. He does run to my back door when he wants outside. He’ll scream to get my attention to let me know he wants outside. I do give him fresh food. I am trying to be careful with soft foods as it makes him regurgitate, and then he shakes his tail feathers. His vet is an avian one, and she was apart of a huge shelter. She’s very educated about Ekkie’s, and birds in general. She’s taught me quite a bit. I definitely made some mistakes like giving Nico mushy food.

[Pajarita]

I am sorry but mushy food does NOT make them regurgitate. Regurgitation by a single bird (meaning not one that is paired to another and it's feeding its mate or the babies during breeding season which is perfectly normal) ALWAYS means overly hormonal. Period. But it's not mushy food that does it (this is something we used to believe years ago when we did not know enough about them), it's the wrong light schedule (research avian photoperiodism, avian endocrine system and avian reproductive system) and the wrong diet that does it. ALL my birds (and I have a lot of them now and had around 240 in my rescue, including the ekkies that did not regurgitate, either) eat mushy food every single day of their lives and they are not overly hormonal. They get hormonal ONLY during breeding season but even then, none of my single birds and most of my paired ones don't even regurgitate because I don't give them nests. Birds hormonal production triggers are strictly environmental: daylight length, weather and diet but, when we say diet, we mean protein content and not whether the food itself is hard or soft or mushy or whatever.

Nutriberries are seeds and they are not good for ekkies. Like I said, do not take an avian vet's opinion on diet or behavior, they do not study these subjects - they study biology, anatomy, physiology, pathogens, diseases and medicines. That's it. So, if the bird is sick or injured, they are the best person for it but, when it comes to husbandry (diet, light, housing, behavior, etc), they know as much as anybody else who has not studied the subjects.

Don't take anybody's word for anything - not even mine! Do your own research and you will see.

I am attaching links to avian medicine texts so you can see for yourself that avian vets do NOT study parrots' nutrition, dietary ecology or behavior:
https://www.melbhattan.com/handbook-of-avian-medicine/
http://avianmedicine.net/wp/publication ... -medicine/