How to find a good breeder

[CaitlinRice413]

[friend2parrots]

This is an extremely important topic to raise, and something I think everyone should be aware of when they are looking to purchase a bird from a breeder.

Others on the forum may want to add to the list below. Although I am not a breeder, this is what I learned from the research I did when looking for my two birds as babies from a breeder:

The best breeders:

- are professionally affiliated with a national or international body, such as The American Federation of Aviculture, The Avicultural Society of Australia, or the various European bodies. such memberships give the breeder accountability. breeders who have memberships in these associations are more likely to follow certain guidelines set forth by the associations, and they work according to "studbooks" , or official records of bird genetics and family history.

- dont overcrowd the birds. ideally, each pair of parent-birds that the breeder keeps has access to a spacious flight.

- allow prospective customers into the aviary, after sanitizing. ( may require you to change your clothes, sanitize shoes and hands, wear a shower cap. this is important, as it enables you to verify the conditions in which the birds are bred.

- do NOT WINGCLIP babies, and give them opportunity to fledge (learn to fly)

- sell babies that are FULLY WEANED before they are allowed to go home

- the babies are socialized with humans AND birds.

- its great if the breeder allows customers whove placed a deposit to visit and play with the birds for just a little while each day.

- ALL the birds in the breeder's facility should look lively and healthy and should be witnessed flying about in good health.

- the best breeders provide a guarantee for the health of their birds, in writing. its usually for a certain amount of time.

a lot of good breeders dont ship birds or do any kind of mail order with birds. this is because birds are sensitive creatures, and can react badly to the stress. also, they feel that its best to be able to see and interact with the baby and check out its living conditions.

[friend2parrots]

But what distinguishes a breeder as being excellent from one who just provides a basic humane living situation?

just occurred to me that i focused in the previous post primarily on basic standards of spacious housing and healthy rearing that breeders need to follow. i didnt mention a couple of REALLY important things that have to do with behavioral issues, that I will list below, in an effort to answer the other question caitlin raised:

How do you know whether or not the birds have been handled properly?

from my readings on parrot behavior, i have learned that parent raised birds end up being more emotionally stable, resilient, and less prone to neurotic behaviors like plucking, and less prone to aggression, biting, and less prone to screaming. the bird turns out to be healthier, and better adjusted, and just as sweet a pet. in the parent-raised school of thought, the breeder simply leaves the babies in the parents nest and aviary, and the baby eats, sleeps, and lives with its parents. this school of thought argues that the less handling by the breeder the better.
parent raised birds may take a little bit more time to tame and train initially, but it is worth it, as they do soon enough train beautifully and tend to have more balanced and calm personalities. there's an excellent parrot behavior specialist in the UK named Greg Glendell who has advocated parent-raising for years. hopefully more breeders will start to listen to him.

if the breeder is not up to date with this relatively cutting edge perspective, and still handfeeds the babies, the babies can still turn out alright if the breeder allowed the parents to raise the chicks for a certain amount of time. its different with different species, as to how long they MUST be left with the parents before handfeeding, in order for them to still be bird-socialized properly. research this for your particular species.

also, make sure the breeder does not remove eggs from the parents, put them in an incubator, and after the baby hatches, feeds the baby by machine and not human hands. its called gavage feeding. this is inhumane and creates creatures that almost invariably grow up to be biters, screamers, and pluckers because they have been deprived of parenting from either a human or a bird. this is the absolute worst of mass-production parrot farming. every effort should be made to avoid these mass production breeders.

also avoid breeders who have over-cuddled their baby birds. then the baby wont know how to exist outside of constant attention from a doting human being. this is another recipe for a screaming, plucking, biting bird.

i would not advise anyone to buy a color mutation bird. color mutation birds have increased risk of every known disease and are likely to die an early, often tragic death from cancer and other ailments, and also genetic diseases. i would advise anyone looking to buy a bird from a breeder to get a NORMAL, WILD-TYPE bird of the species you are interested in, because it will be a healthier bird.

the only sure way to find out if youre dealing with a quality breeder is to investigate them thoroughly, ask a lot of questions, insist on the things you want, and see if they are willing to cooperate with your requests.

i hope these posts were helpful

[friend2parrots]

just a note that i've significantly edited my two posts above.

[cml]

Great advice friend2parrots!

[CaitlinRice413]

[4theloveofbirds]

I have read lots on the topic of what to look for in a good breeder, however how does one go about finding a breeder? Anyone have any good recommendations? I hope this question does not constitute as advertising to those who may respond

I have had the hardest time finding a breeder. I live in Alaska and there are no breeders to speak of locally and nobody rehoming the kind of parrot I would like. I'm beyond frustrated lol. Any suggestions on how to find a good breeder would be greatly appreciated. Oh my parrot of interest is an African Gray.

Thanks

[friend2parrots]

Was wondering if there is a directory of certified breeders or how do you check if someone has it? I looked at a very basic website, birdbreeders.com. I don't really know where else to look and with that one everyone has a 5 star rating so I don't think it is as credible as a rating system implies. Plus everyone lists every parrot known to man in order for their name to show up on a search when they don't actually deal with those birds. So it is hard to tell if someone has a compound of unfortunate parrots or just a couple pairs.

birdbreeders.com is like a classifieds or marketplace. breeders advertise and sell their stock there. just like you wouldn't trust amazon.com "ratings" to determine the quality of a book, I would not trust the ratings there. birdbreeders.com is however useful in that it contains a directory of breeders on a regional and species basis. the site can help you construct a list of breeders you can then contact and further investigate.

many high quality breeders are not aggressive about selling, and only breed their birds on a "per-order" basis. meaning, you have to let them know that you are interested in getting a bird from them, and they will put you on a list, and the next time their pair go to nest, they will inform you. means you may have to wait a while for your bird. this kind of breeder is generally are hard to discover through the internet, as many of them dont advertise themselves. you can locate them through the avicultural associations. (see below)

In the US, there are some certifications that are given out by the major avicultural associations, for having completed certain educational courses offered by the association. but graduating from those courses still does not guarantee a quality breeder. you still need to further investigate them.

In the United States, the two major national aviculture associations are:

The American Federation of Aviculture (AFA) http://www.afabirds.org/index.shtml
Avicultural Society of America (ASA) http://asabirds.org/

Both these organization have members from around the world, so if you are not located in the US, you can still use them to find a reputable breeder.

The AFA is a federation of national, regional, and state aviculture associations. ASA is a Society unto itself. both are affiliated with other organizations, including zoos, conservation societies, rescues, etc. browse both their websites thoroughly for listings of national and state level contact people, and species-level contact people whom you can email for advice on where/how to identify high-quality breeders in your area of the particular species you are interested in. let them know how far you are willing to travel. once they give you a list of breeders, you can work down the list and investigate each one individually.

when you talk to the contact people mentioned above, ask them if they can point you toward breeders who follow studbooks and genetic histories for the species they work with, who keep scrupulous records, and who regularly trade birds with other high-quality, genetics minded breeders, so as to ensure genetic variety in their stock into the next generation.

a word of caution: in your search you are likely to encounter breeders who clip their baby birds wings, for convenience, out of ignorance, or adherence to oldfashioned and incorrect ideas of safety. the best breeders don't clip. it is worth it to search long and hard for those who don't clip. if youve thoroughly exhausted all your options, and if all you can find are breeders who clip, make sure that the breeder youre dealing with is a cooperative one, who will agree to make an exception for you, and leave the baby that you choose unclipped.

it must be noted that the search for a good, high quality breeder for the larger and/or rarer species may be difficult and long for the following reason: with the downturn in the US (and global) economy, there has been a concomitant decrease in the demand for the larger and rarer (read: expensive) birds as pets. due to reduced demand and financial difficulties maintaining their stock, many of the high quality breeders have closed their facilities. the few high quality breeders for the larger species who still do exist may not breed their birds regularly. what this means is that you may have to travel quite far, and wait a long time, to find a high quality bird breeder of many of the larger and rarer species. but the travel and the wait would definitely be worth it.

[friend2parrots]

have read lots on the topic of what to look for in a good breeder, however how does one go about finding a breeder? Anyone have any good recommendations? I hope this question does not constitute as advertising to those who may respond I have had the hardest time finding a breeder. I live in Alaska and there are no breeders to speak of locally and nobody rehoming the kind of parrot I would like. I'm beyond frustrated lol. Any suggestions on how to find a good breeder would be greatly appreciated. Oh my parrot of interest is an African Gray.

4theloveofbirds, please read my last post right before this one, i have advised on this issue there. i would also suggest you email the regional-level and species-level contact people listed on the websites of those avicultural associations i refer to in that post, explain your situation to them, and see if they can help you. you can also do a search for Alaska at birdbreeders.com, and then investigate the resulting breeders as described above. if you havent, also try doing a google search for "Alaska aviary breeder African Grey" or some such combination, and then further investigate.

[friend2parrots]

just a note that i've edited and added content to my last two posts.