Macaws:
Red Shouldered (Hahn's) Macaw
Severe Macaw
Blue And Gold Macaw
Blue Throated Macaw
Military Macaw
Red Fronted Macaw
Scarlet Macaw
Green Winged Macaw
Hyacinth Macaw
Weight Management for captive companion parrots is a necessity but does not get the attention it deserves. Like wing clipping, free-feeding is still the status quo. But just like wing clipping, free-feeding is neither natural nor healthy for parrots. In this and the next few articles, I am going to share with you some of my success with using food management and why you should too. The intricate details of actually applying it, however, I'm going to suggest you buy my book which will be out by the end of the month. Stay tuned.
Some people mistakenly think I starve my parrots to get them to perform. Neither of these things are true. First of all, they are not starved and I will get into this in great depth in this article. Second of all, I don't weight manage my parrots for doing tricks! I will go into great length about motivation (and how food management applies to it) in the next article. But the important point that I want you to leave with is that number one reason I weight manage my parrots is for their health!
I would weight manage Kili & Truman entirely regardless of tricks, shows, and training. There are periods of time (sometimes months) when I'm too busy or too lazy to train them as regularly as I usually do. Yet I still weight manage them during these periods because I am convinced that this is healthier for them. Their health and well being is of paramount importance to me and I'd give up the tricks if they were in any way conflicting. But the good news is that they're not. The byproduct of the weight management that I do for health is food motivation for training (which will be covered next time).
There is nothing natural about free-feeding your parrot by leaving food in its bowl all day long. Parrots in the wild do not spend all day eating. They neither need to, want to, nor are able to. Although they "could" decide to try and eat at times they shouldn't, they won't. And that is because the outcome would likely be a bad one. First a simple example that I doubt anyone would argue against. Night. The parrot is not going to get off its roost at night to go searching for food. Even though it has the freedom to go eat at night, it doesn't. It would probably crash into a tree (like George of the Jungle) trying to fly at night! Thus it is silly for parrot owners to be leaving food in the cage over night. The parrot won't be eating it but it will attract nocturnal pests such as bugs and rodents. So don't leave food in the cage at night.
Now let's look at daytime feeding. In the wild, you generally won't see parrots (and in fact most birds) eating in the daytime. In fact you won't see them at all because they are probably in some tree napping. During all my travels in Africa, the only time I have seen African parrots eating (or out and about) was in the morning and evening. In the mid-day time, it is too hot and too dangerous for a parrot to be out getting lunch. Birds of prey take advantage of daytime air currents fly around and catch the birds that couldn't wait till evening to eat. The heat is also a problem because it becomes more difficult for parrots to fly in extreme heat. Since most parrots are equatorial, this plays a significant role as well.
Thus in the wild parrots don't really have access to food all day long. They only eat in the morning and evening. Since this is the schedule that the environment demands, parrots are evolved to best function with this kind of feeding. Their metabolism, crop, and other aspects of their digestive system optimize them to take in food and use the energy accordingly.
The other aspect of food management that naturally happens in the wild is weight management. In fact this is true of all animals. Simply put, there's not enough food for everyone. So many animals just don't make it. The ones that do, are getting by on the bare minimum. But that's ok because millions of years of avian evolution has lead to the highly efficient bodies that these parrots now posses. They are like that car that gets the best gas mileage. Even on the last gallon of gas, they'll go very far.
In the wild, food portions are regulated by the environment as well as the competition. Sometimes there is more plant matter (food) and other times there is less. When there is less, the strongest parrots make it and the weaker ones die. When there is a greater food abundance, the strong ones still eat but the weaker ones get to live too. For this reason, the amount the birds get to consume is rarely more than the minimum. Occasionally there are opportunities to really pig out (for example a fruit tree just blossomed). Parrots take that opportunity to stuff themselves to the limit because future feedings are never certain. They may go days without food afterward.
Parrots have no natural shut off mechanism when to stop eating besides being stuffed to the max. In the short term this is ok but in the long term it leads to obesity. Since there is so little food and so much competition in the wild, the bird will quickly return to equilibrium. In the unnatural household environment with a constant supply of food, the parrot will act on its instinct to stuff itself now. But it will continue to do so daily because that natural food limit is never restored that will take its weight back down. In the wild parrots don't need to "know" when to stop eating to be healthy. The resource limits and competition naturally dictate this and millions of years of evolution have optimized the parrot's body to work with that natural limit. All of the parrots that required a differing amount of food than the environment would offer died before they could reproduce. This not only includes the ones that couldn't get by on too little food. This also includes the ones that may have eaten too much to the point where obesity degraded their bodies. But since food tends to be on the low side rather than high side, the natural instinct for the bird is to top off now just in case.
Understanding the natural constraints that work in the wild help us realize that unlimited food availability is unnatural and unhealthy. The parrot is driven to eat as much as it can to protect against later deprivation but since it never comes, the parrot ends up overweight. But this problem of becoming overweight goes beyond just the amount of food eaten. It also has to do with many other unnatural factors. The parrots are fed too much food, with too many calories, that is too easy to get, with too little exercise! All aspects of household pet life for the parrot drive it toward obesity.
Parrots have strong immune systems and tend to stay healthy. However, they do not have good defenses against obesity. The reason is simple, you don't see obese parrots in the wild so they don't need to have evolved protection against obesity problems. They sooner have natural ways of surviving and dealing with excess hunger than excess weight.
When you come to think of it, the same hold true for people. Even though we "could" eat at any part of the day, we don't. Or at least we shouldn't. Humans tend to eat at several scheduled meals a day as well. We don't go around eating all day long and neither should our parrots. And when people do eat a little all the time, they tend to get overweight and not feel good. Just think about sitting around with friends with some tapas or snack foods around. After a few hours, you are beyond stuffed and can't believe how much you ate a little at a time. Likewise for the parrot that is presented with food all day long, even if it doesn't really need or want it, it picks at it just because it's there. The bird ends up eating food that it could really do without. Eating out of boredom is unnecessary as well as unhealthy. Human children tend to stay pretty fit while they are young because they don't have non-stop access to food and only eat when their parents feed them. But as we get older and our access restrictions are lifted, it is harder to keep the weight off. Instead of thinking of food/weight management as deprivation, think of scheduled/portioned meals as healthy feeding for a child.
Whether seeds, pellets, fruit, or other household foods, the things we feed our parrot are generally far more packed with calories per mouthful than what they would eat in the wild. Fact is most of these foods are engineered for maximum yield for human consumption (or at least chosen for it). Since there are more calories in the food by volume, even if the parrot tries to eat the amount that feels right to it (without intentionally putting on fat for a rainy day), it will get more calories than naturally. Next, the parrot isn't spending any energy to actually eat the food. The household parrot simply eats the food out of a bowl instead of flying for miles, climbing, and foraging for it. Lastly, since the parrot is confined, it simply cannot get as much exercise as it would in the wild.
Most parrots spend a lot of time in a cage. This is time they are not flying and barely climbing. Most parrots are clipped and can't even get any exercise when they are out of the cage. But even the ones that are flighted can only fly short distances in the confines of our home for the limited time that we let them. Even well exercised parrots like Kili & Truman get far less flight and exercise than their wild counterparts. They only spend about an hour a day flying at home during training. Even when I take them to the park or gym to fly, that's only a few days a week. Wild parrots don't get a day off. They are flying and working hard every single day. So no matter how many calories they consume in their limited food, they end up spending it all for feeding again and living.
Since it is outside of our capability to give our parrots the same amount of exercise that would be mandated by the excessive food abundance they consume, training and weight management are the things we must resort to.
The overweight parrot is also the parrot that is hardest to give sufficient exercise. Even flighted, the overweight parrot is not motivated to fly for food and it is hard for it to fly because it is heavy. For airplanes, you need to quadruple the power when you double the weight. So for a parrot that is 10-30% overweight, flying requires 40-120% as much effort. The numbers may not be exact but it should illustrate why excess weight can adversely affect a parrot's weight both directly and indirectly. Directly by leading to obesity related problems. Indirectly by discouraging it to fly and thereby preventing it from getting sufficient exercise.
While motivation to fly for food is stronger when the parrot is more hungry, the direct affect of the weight plays as much if not a greater role! Over the years I have watched how my parrots fly at different weights and have definitely seen a huge difference. Even when the motivation exists for the parrot to fly while at a heavy weight (example is the parrot is overweight but then misses a meal), you can tell that the parrot is struggling to stay airborne. The parrot has to fly faster, you hear more flapping noise, and the parrot tire out much quicker. This is as strong a deterrent from flying as there can be. On the flipside, when my parrots are on the lighter side, I have discovered that it takes far less food related motivation for them to fly. Even after a meal when they are no longer hungry, they are more likely to willingly fly. The lighter weight parrot will fly more because it is easier for it to fly. Less motivation is required to get it to fly because it is easier and the rewards are sooner justified.
This leads to discovering the cyclical nature of the polar opposites of a parrot's weight. Either the bird is going to be light, fit, and healthy or heavy, obese, and suffer health problems. There is basically no middle ground. The heavy parrot will eat a lot, exercise little, fly little, and thus stay heavy. The light weight parrot will have a lot of food driven motivation, fly eagerly, get more exercise, and become stronger. As the light parrot becomes stronger (from flying a lot), it will be able to fly with even greater ease and thus be able to get even more exercise flying for even less food reward.
Another reason it is unhealthy for parrots to be on the heavy side has to do with hormones and reproduction. An overweight parrot is more likely to become hormonal and develop behavioral problems related to that. Those parrots get less out of cage time and attention because people have trouble dealing with them so they tend to remain caged more with little left to do than eat. The heavy parrot is more likely to lay infertile eggs and become egg bound. The lean parrot that has just enough to sustain itself but not another, is less likely to become hormonal or lay eggs. The lean parrot is more focused on feeding itself and its own survival to be in the reproductive state that can cause those other behavioral and health problems.
Thus the healthier approach to keeping companion parrots is to properly manage their food intake to keep them at a healthy weight. Usually, that healthy weight is well below the weight the parrot is on free-feed. In fact free-feed weight shouldn't even be used as a standard or be called normal weight. Free-feed weight is unnatural and is actually overweight for what the parrot would naturally be. So when a reduction of weight from free-feed weight is discussed, it's usually to get the parrot to stop being overweight rather than some kind of deprivation.
Parrot's food intake should be managed such that they attain and maintain the optimal healthy weight as can be inferred from body condition by an Avian Veterinarian. I am not suggesting that the target weight should be determined by behavior, mathematics, guesswork, or chance.
Kili & Truman recently paid the avian vet a visit for a check up. Partly because it is about time for an annual check up, partly because I wanted an outside opinion about their weight and body condition, and most importantly because I'm having a baby. I want to ensure that my existing birds are in top health before I add another. You can watch the videos of two separate avian veterinarians, Dr. Alexandra Wilson, DVM and Dr. Anthony Pilny, DVM, ABVP, giving their expert opinion about the trained parrots' condition. It is mainly evaluated based upon breast muscle, keel sharpness, breast shape, and checking for other fat deposits. A rounded or somewhat sharp keel bone is what we're looking for. Cleavage, where the breast meat/fat stick out past the keel bone, is a sure sign of obesity. Use this as a basic idea of what to consider, but then have your parrot evaluated by an avian vet to determine the optimal weight and condition for your bird.
I also opted to have some blood work done on one of the parrot's to check for any abnormalities or deficiencies. Since they are on similar diets, I decided one would be enough unless there were issues. Truman took one for the team and gave blood like a champ.
The blood chemistry turned out perfectly healthy and neither vet thought either bird was remotely underweight. In fact they both said they are at a good healthy weight and could safely be even lower. I brought them into the clinic at about the lowest typical weight I've been keeping them at lately. The training motivation at this weight is great, but I'm not doing it for that reason. I target the optimal healthy weight based on body condition and then take the training motivation byproduct that I get with it (which in fact is very high). Surprisingly the optimal healthy weight is much lower than the weight I would keep the birds at strictly for the sake of "starving them to make them do tricks." At the last vet wellness exam, the vet warned me that Kili was getting too heavy. The reason that happened was because I stopped weighing her and fed her as much as possible as long as she performed well. Well, I've since learned that this is not healthy and that I must manage the weight for health rather than just for training.
In conclusion, Kili & Truman are healthy parrots. Their weight is kept low with love for the sake of keeping them healthy and closer to what would be natural. Just because "nature" may be brutal, doesn't mean household life has to be. They get to live relatively sheltered lives, enjoy their health, and never have to starve. Their weight may be kept lower than if they were given unlimited food, but this is much healthier for them. Their condition and behavior is better as a result. Of the 3 avian veterinarians and many other experts, no one has ever told me that the birds are underweight, unhealthy, starved, malnourished, or in any way deprived. In fact they are considered healthy in all regards.
I could fill an entire book about this topic of food management, but there isn't sufficient interest yet. People don't realize just important it is. But food management isn't relevant just to professional trainers nor is it too difficult for responsible parrot owners to implement at home. Just like the attitude about seeds has changed to pellets, clipping is starting to change to flight, I hope to convince people the importance of managing how much food their parrots consume.
This article isn't meant to teach you how to food or weight manage. It is merely to try to convince you that food management is the way to go for the health of your parrot. I hope this article will convince you to begin learning about how you can nurture your parrot's health by ensuring it is fed the correct amount. Absolutely don't just reduce the amount your parrot eats without a significant understanding of how it is done properly. Keep in mind that some birds may already be at the right weight and that management should not be applied to baby birds, sick, or extremely elderly ones. The topic is quite extensive. I have written about it in great detail in my upcoming book, The Parrot Wizard's Guide to Well Behaved Parrots. It will be available by the beginning of June and it covers all aspects of accomplishing well behaved companion parrots.*
*Note the book is now available and can be purchased on Amazon or from ParrotWizard.com.
Kili & Truman paid a visit to New York City. Even though they live in New York City in the borough of Brooklyn, they never really had the occasion to visit any of the crowded touristy spots in Manhattan that outsiders come to think of as New York City. Upon some reflection I realized that the trained parrot duo has been to many other cities including Phoenix, Chicago, and St Louis. But they had not really been around New York that much. So the birds hitched up in their Aviator Harnesses, swiped their metro cards, and were off for their first grand adventure around the Big Apple.
The parrots handled the 8 hour non-stop excursions like champs. The expedition began in Brooklyn where the birds boarded the subway to head to Manhattan. Getting out at 77th Street, the parrots got to pass Park Avenue as we headed over to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Folks admired the birds on the steps of the Met on their way into the art gallery. On our way to Central Park, a couple from Spain wanted to see the parrots. They explained in Spanish that they have a parrot named Lolita back at home.
Truman especially liked Central Park. He was taking in the sights and sounds of the natural haven amidst a bustling city. Everything was blossoming and the beautiful weather left no denying that spring is here. After crossing the Bow Bridge, the parrots ordered a hot dog from a hot dog stand. They didn't care much for eating dog but they did enjoy its buns. A piece of soft pretzel really made their day. While devouring lunch, the birds listened to some jazz musicians playing in the park and Kili even dropped them a coin for their efforts.
Leaving the park, we hit the busy streets of midtown. The birds admired the Plaza hotel and agreed that they could get used to that kind of lavish lifestyle. Proceeding down 5th avenue, Kili did a bit of window shopping. She was admiring the lovely feathers around some of the outfits in the displays. Some fire trucks blasting their horns zoomed by to the scene of a car accident but the birds were unmoved. We continued down the bustling streets with the birds loosely sitting on my hand or shoulder. They were entirely unbothered by the crowds and in fact enjoying the attention.
We passed through Rockefeller Center and made a stop across the street from Radio City Music Hall as Kili & Truman put on a little show for passing children. From there we continued westbound and stopped by the Ed Sullivan theater where not long ago Kili performed on the Late Show with David Letterman.
Then we came to Times Square, one of the busiest places on Earth. Kili & Truman were not in the least bit freaked out. The dazzling lights and infinite crowds sooner intrigued the parrots than caused any alarm. In fact they were so relaxed that they had no problem showing off their favorite tricks to huge crowds of onlookers. Kili played dead right in the middle of the pavement of Times Square. Perhaps viewers thought she died of the overwhelming experience of being in such a place but sure enough she was "just restin" cause she was up and in my hands in no time.
From Times Square it was a short walk over to Bryant Park which lies behind the NY Public Library. The parrots pretended they were pigeons and sat on top of the lions guarding the library. We continued down 5th Avenue and passed the Empire State Building. We kept going south while making stops along the way so people could meet the parrots. There was a souvenir shop with a giant Uncle Sam and Truman just had to stop to perch on his giant finger. It made Truman look small like a Senegal Parrot but with the wrong colored head!
We kept heading south until we reached the Flat Iron building in Madison Square. This building was once the tallest in NYC. The birds hopped on the subway to head downtown. During the brief train ride, they entertained commuters with their tricks and antics. Getting off at Whitehall, we were at nearly the southern most tip of Manhattan. Kili and Truman rode the bull on Broadway and then posed for pictures with the Statue of Liberty. After leaving Battery Park, we briefly headed north in the direction of the nearly completed Freedom Tower but then turned east toward Wall Street. The birds checked out the New York Stock Exchange and even dropped off their "taxes" at the treasury.
Next, the trained parrots headed to City Hall, the operational center of the city. This was a convenient place from which to begin their journey home. We headed across the Brooklyn Bridge back to Brooklyn while scenes of the city remained behind us. Some Italian tourists managed to bike across the bridge and make it to Brooklyn so Kili & Truman posed on their handle bars for pictures. We ended the trip with a walk across the Promenade with some final views of the city.
The birds traversed 10 strenuous miles of city streets riding on me. Without toys, cage, or carrier, the birds depended on me as their perch and transport. They met hundreds of people along the way and got to take in all sorts of sights and sounds of the city. When they got home they were spent. They did no make a peep for the rest of the evening and I got to relish in the absolute silence.
Parrot Wizard Michael Sazhin Brings Kili and Truman to East Hartford
More than 8 million viewers have watched YouTube sensations Kili and Truman perform astounding feats, and these tricky parrots--who have also been seen on America's Got Talent, The Steve Harvey Show and Late Show with David Letterman--and world-famous trainer, Michael Sazhin, will make their first live Northeast appearance at The Parrot Club's monthly meeting in East Hartford on Tuesday, April 9.
The public is invited to this intimate, interactive performance showcasing the talents and friendly personalities of these avian entertainers and their devoted "coach," whose notoriety skyrocketed when he created the "World Record 20 Parrot Tricks in 2 Minutes" video starring Kili, a Senegal Parrot: It's been viewed more than 1.7 million times on YouTube alone. Attendees of all ages will have the chance to see Kili and her sidekick Truman, a Cape Parrot, flying, flapping, waving, talking, slam dunking and executing other zany stunts. Sazhin will answer training questions and invite audience participation during his first ever bird club presentation.
The program begins at 7:15 p.m. (doors open at 6:45) at the Veterans Memorial Clubhouse in East Hartford, Connecticut. Admission is free for members of The Parrot Club, the state's oldest companion bird club, and for children 12 and under. There is a $3 suggested donation for adult guests.
Based in New York City, Sazhin is the founder of an online community of parrot owners and is best known for his kiliparrot YouTube channel. He is the inventor of the Parrot Training Perch and sells products for parrot training at ParrotWizard.com. He also provides training tips for bird owners via his TrainedParrot.com blog. Self-educated in ornithology and with a background in psychology, Sazhin is a strong proponent of keeping parrots flighted. His entertaining videos are also educational, providing inspiration for those who keep parrots as household companion pets.
The Parrot Club, founded 39 years ago as the Connecticut Association for Aviculture, is a non-profit organization dedicated to education about responsible ownership and care of exotic birds. The club provides educational outreach programs; sponsors field trips; supports the work of bird rescue, breeding and habitat preservation organizations; and hosts a variety of speakers and programs during its monthly meetings, held the second Tuesday evening of each month, March through December, at East Hartford's Veterans Memorial Clubhouse. The club welcomes bird enthusiasts of all ages. Membership information is available at all Parrot Club events.
The Veterans Memorial Clubhouse is located at 100 Sunset Ridge Drive in East Hartford, Connecticut. For more information about this event, visit the organization's Web site, www.theparrotclub.org.
I recently returned from a voyage into the heart of east Africa. For over two weeks I traveled around the countries of Ethiopia, South Sudan, Sudan, Eritrea, Djibouti, Somaliland, and Somalia. In these travels I experienced many different places, people, animals, and birds. I would like to share a bit about each of these countries with you as well as a glimpse of what I saw through my videos. I did not see any Meyers Parrots or Red Bellied Parrots but I traveled through the ecosystems where they might be seen. I did see parakeets in Djibouti and share a lot of footage and stories about them. Thank you for reading and enjoy.
In Addis Ababa, the capital of Ethiopia you can see the fossil remains of Lucy the famous Australopithecus afarensis. However, the bones on display are just a copy like in any other museum. The real ones are not publicly displayed for fear of theft. Unlike its surrounding neighbors, Ethiopia is predominantly Christian.
South Sudan is the world's newest nation, accepted into the UN in just 2011. The skies of the capital city of Juba are filled with Black Kites lazily circling about in thermal updrafts. Despite recent hardships, the markets are bustling with commerce and activity. The savannah woodlands of South Sudan are in the middle of the range of Meyer's Parrots, Poicephalus Meyeri. However, because I was visiting during the dry seasons, there was no opportunity to see them. I was told by local farmers that during the wet season they approach in large numbers and pillage the millet harvest.
Khartoum, Sudan's capital city, is located on the merge of the Blue Nile and White Nile. Despite skyscrapers and endless concrete, there's no hiding the fact that the city is located in a desert climate. Sand blows down the streets making you feel like you are located in a sandblasting cabinet. You'll be lucky to find the contours of your face in tact after spending any length of time outdoors. Sudan was the center of the Nubia, a powerful ancient empire that once even conquered Egypt.
Now Eritrea is something else. This little country, once a part of Ethiopia, is one of the world's last remaining totalitarian police states. This little nation took the remains of Ethiopia's coastline entirely away leaving Ethiopia with no access to the Red Sea. Asmara, Eritrea's capital, is a remnant of Italian colonial rule. With it's Art Deco laden boulevards, Fiats, and Cafe's it's not a wonder the city is known as Little Roma. Yet, since the country severed ties with most of its neighbors, it relies almost entirely on domestic commerce. There is very little import so the country is living almost as it did back when Italians lived in those central quarters. Donkeys and manual labor take place of machinery, scrap metal is meticulous reused, and cars are few and far in between. There's never a problem finding a parking spot but buses are packed full. A tank graveyard on the cities outskirts is a reminder of the long war with Ethiopia for independence. Massawa, the port city, to this days lays in ruins since the war some twenty years past.
Although Djibouti borders Eritrea, it was impossible to travel from one country to the next. It required a flight first to Yemen and then to Djibouti because of their severed relations. Unlike Eritrea, Djibouti has good relations with Ethiopia and is prospering on international commerce. Djibouti serves as one of the primary ports of import for Ethiopia. For this reason, it is occasionally possible to see diplomats and businessmen in this unlikely corner of Africa. Lake Assal is a salt water lake below sea level.
Now I have to tell you about who else was staying at the Sheraton hotel. My dad told me he saw a green parrot similar to Kili out the window. I told him he was dreaming, that there can't be Senegal Parrots in East Africa! I didn't believe him till I saw for myself. Except this was no Senegal Parrot. With a long tail and a red chin, it was immediately obvious that this was a Rose-Ringed Parakeet. And sure enough there it was sitting on the outside sill of our hotel window on the top floor. The reason he was there became obvious when I saw the gaping hole in the sill. I sat quietly watching and saw his mate emerge from their little nest. She stretched one wing at a time, dropped, a load, and shot off with the male to follow. They flew over to a nearby tree and got busy. I told them, "Cmon guys! Get a room!" so they did. They flew back over to the Sheraton hotel and went back in to lay eggs in the penthouse suite.
During the daytime, the parakeets were nowhere to be seen or heard. However, in the mornings and evenings they were out and about. I counted at least 3 pairs living in various parts of the hotel wall. Occasionally the parakeets would fly off in small groups to feed on neighboring mango trees but would shortly return to chill in the hotel top. I was thrilled to watch the birds interact with each other and their surroundings for a good length of time. They're shrill calls, green color, and flight patterns make them easily distinguishable from any other local parrot.
We crossed the border by land to neighboring Somaliland. Somaliland is still technically part of the nation of Somalia and is not recognized. However, Somaliland has its own government, currency, border control, and is run more like a nation than the rest of Somalia. Yet, Somaliland is not recognized by the rest of the world as the separate country that it is. The city of Zeila still displays war scars from the fight for independence from Somalia.
There are vast expanses of desert where short of a few camels and herders, there is nothing to be seen for hundreds of miles. Camels are occasionally brought to villages to drink well water and eventually are brought to Hargeisa to be sold in the famous camel market. There are more camels living in Somalia than people. They are used for transport and meat but are mainly exported to Saudi Arabia in exchange for cars and other necessities. Because of out of control inflation, Somaliland's currency is practically worthless. Instead of armored cars, money changers transport their bricks of paper currency by wheelbarrow. Cave paintings in Laas Gaal were only discovered recently and are considered to be nearly 10,000 years old.
The only African animals to be seen in all of Somalia were gathered in one place. The garbage dump! Marabous, Vultures, Spoonbills, Jackals, Hyenas, Baboons, and Warthogs, animals normally found in Africa's Savannahs, are confined to this toxic waste dump. It is the one place they are safe from human predation and food is plentiful. Remains of slaughtered goats, camels, and cows are dumped here and make for a feast to be remembered. Toxic wastepools of motor oils and chemicals form lagoons for water birds. This is a Somalia Safari:
Mogadishu, the capital of Somalia, is the world's most dangerous city. A friend of mine exclaimed, "Mogadishu!? Why would you want to go there? If God wanted to give the world an enema, he'd start by sticking the hose in Mogadishu!"
Mogadishu has been war ravished for the last 20 years. The situation has just begun to stabilize and peace hangs by a thin thread. There is no value of human life, dignity, or compassion here. Young children are too busy shooting each other to bother learning to read or write so the literacy rate is under 20%. There is no economy to speak of except exporting a few bananas, most money comes from drugs, looting, ransoming, and piracy. Car bombs, IEDs, terrorists, street war run rampant. There are few places we could even get a glimpse of. The streets are perilous. If you want an idea of what hell looks like, this is it. This is Somalia.
I have received much criticism of my atypical approach to using the clicker from beginners to experts alike. Many have noticed that I don't always give treats after using the clicker and that I make clicks while training two parrots simultaneously. I'd like to take a little time to explain how and why I am doing this and the impact it has on parrot training.
First of all, let's go over the typical approach to using a clicker as a bridge. At the moment the parrot does the right thing, a click is issued by the trainer using a clicker. Then at the trainers soonest convenience, a treat is given to the parrot. In other words, the clicker is a promise to give a treat as reward for the behavior being performed at the moment of the click. This is a highly effective techniques for capturing and shaping behaviors in training. Using the clicker can consistently and precisely mark the desired behavior so that the parrot can catch on and repeat it more readily.
I have used and do recommend the standard method of clicker training described above. For the vast majority of parrot owners, trainers, and performers, this may be the optimal approach. However, I have taken the clicker a step further and would like to present my method for those parrot owners and trainers that want to achieve even greater success with clicker training. The fundamental prerequisite is 6-18 months of consistent and successful clicker training using the standard method. The parrot should have already learned a bunch of different tricks and be reliable at demonstrating them. Attempting my special approach with an inadequately trained parrot will surely ruin the clicker and confuse the bird so I do not recommend this approach for most people. Only put this into effect if you have had extensive success training your parrot and want to take it one step further.
My clicker approach is made up of two parts. First is transforming the clicker from a bridge to a secondary reinforcer and the second is to use it in this way with multiple parrots simultaneously. Both of these parts require extensive successful clicker training of one bird at a time. Thereafter, either one or both of these can be applied although I would put off training two parrots simultaneously to the last. If you don't anticipate to move away from one click means one treat, you can skip to clicker training two parrots together.
The main reason I moved away from one click means one treat was because I wanted to train Kili to perform many different tricks but couldn't give her treats for everything or she would get too full. Thus I employed a variable ratio reinforcement schedule when it comes to treats. What this means is that the parrot has to complete the right behavior every time it is asked but only receives a treat some of the time at a random trial. However, one problem with doing this is that if the parrot botches one trick in the process, giving or not giving treats does not provide reliable performance feedback. With classic clicker training, not receiving a treat and likewise not receiving a click mark failure in regards to the bird's behavior. Since treats are necessary for continued motivation but providing them randomly provides poor feedback, I decided to use the clicker every time the right behavior is offered but provide food on a variable interval. Thus the clicker is used a continuous secondary reinforcer while the treats are provided on a variable ratio reinforcement schedule. This works out as a perfect blend of feedback and motivation with minimal satiation and maximum success/improvement.
In this way I can have my parrot run through 10 tricks in a row, click for the 9 correct times, not click for the 1 wrong time, and provide just a single treat at a random point (but only following a correct attempt). The parrot is still told that the 9 attempts were correct and could have earned a treat, 1 attempt was wrong and should not be done that way, and motivation was maintained the entire time. Furthermore, 10 treats could be used to elicit as many as 100 iterations (and thus 100 practices of performing the right tricks the right way at the right time) instead of just 10. This is how my special clicker approach is successful and goes well beyond the classic one click one treat approach. By having 110 trick attempts, 100 correct/successful ones, and 10 incorrect unclicked ones, he parrot has 10 opportunities to learn what not to do and 100 chances to learn what to do for the same number of treats that would have only provided 10 opportunities for learning. This allows my parrots to practice more behaviors, exercise more flight, and be overall more reliable than with the standard clicker approach.
Since the clicker has been so closely associated with food from the beginning, doing things to hear clicks can become desirable and thus a conditioned reinforcer of its own. Since good things tend to happen around clicks but don't have to, the parrots are still more inclined to demonstrate clicker-worthy behavior. This is also a great way to retain motivation through very high ratio variable reinforcement. For example, if I am going to make Kili fly 20 recalls to earn a single treat, as long as she keeps getting clicks, she knows it is worthwhile to keep trying and not give up. She knows from past training that as long as she keeps getting clicks, there will be a treat offered at some point. Since there is no other way to get that treat except to keep trying, that's the course she has to take to earn it.
Keep in mind that I only use this approach while I am sustaining tricks through practice. I do revert to the more effective continuous reinforcement strategy of one click one treat when teaching a fresh new trick. Once the parrot is well accustomed, I add that trick to my list of tricks to practice using variable reinforcement.
There are times when I chain behaviors either out of convenience or because it is a trick that requires multiple components. This is another great time to employ my click for correct behavior rather than treat for every correct behavior approach. Many times when I am training tricks to my parrots, I continue having them fly recalls to me from across the room for exercise. I used to feel bad when I would divert treats away from flight recall (which is valuable exercise) and use them for trick training instead. Lately, I've come up with a much better approach where I make my parrots first fly a long recall (or several) to me just to get the opportunity to practice a new trick to earn a treat.
After years of training, both of my parrots understand very well that new tricks earn treats every time while old behaviors only some of the time (although they are easier so they love to perform them). For this reason, they are very eager to give me some flight recalls for the chance to get a guaranteed treat for learning a new trick. Plus it's simply more fun that way.
Now when it comes to chaining tricks to form a long sequence, the clicker can apply in the same way. Let's take Kili's famous stroller trick (which was performed on the Late Show with David Letterman) as an example. Clearly the complete sequence is comprised of several independent tricks that she must perform in order. First she must pickup her baby, then she must patiently hold it for demonstration, then she must take it over to her stroller (and not the bed) and place it in, then she must walk around the stroller and start pushing it, then she must stop pushing and walk around, then transfer her baby from the stroller to the crib, rock the crib, and then finally wave goodnight to baby. How do you teach such a long chain to a parrot without stopping every couple of seconds to wait for it to eat a treat? This is where the click for every correct behavior but only a treat at a random time approach proves such a success! Obviously I taught Kili the separate tricks that combine into the sequence separately, but when I was finally teaching the complete sequence, I used this exact clicker approach. A problem that I was running into was her eagerness to skip steps to jump to the end and get the one final treat for finishing the sequence. For this reason I went back to the click every correct behavior and offer a random treat to ensure that all steps in the sequence are equally rewarding. After she got really good at the trick, I returned to clicking along the way (to remind her that she is doing things right by not skipping to the end) and only giving one treat at the end. Since she won't get a treat at the end of she misses a click along the way, she learned to patiently go through the entire routine.
The final non-standard complex use of the clicker I employ is teaching two parrots simultaneously while using just one clicker. I sneaky (but too annoying) approach could be to have two different sound makers where one is for each parrot and they know their sound. I differentiate who is earning clicks through attention and eye contact. Even though I say I train the parrots together, it's not actually in the exact same moment. Normally I'll have one bird stay on its training perch while I have the other fly over to me to learn something. The parrot near me knows it is earning the clicks and not the one far away. If I have the two birds on perches next to each other, they know when I am clicking for them because I am looking at them at the time of the click. Sometimes I have them perform the same tricks at the same time. In this case I am looking in a blank way toward both of them. They are exceptionally intelligent and catch onto all of these subtleties. The important thing is that I am consistent in these methods so the specifics they learned apply each time.
Although it might seem that mixing the clicker in the ways I do would be confusing or dilute its effectiveness, this couldn't be further from the truth in reality. Parrots are so highly intelligent and catch on to things very quickly. They learn the multi-dimensional complex of the clicker based on the context they observe. It's like we can hear the sound "toooo" and still be able to understand whether we are talking about "to", "two", or "too". Since my mixed clicker strategy has not resulted in a diminish in clicker effectiveness (and in fact improved it), I am certain that parrots too can learn to understand things in context.
So that is my special mixed method of parrot clicker training. Although I would not recommend anything but the one click-one-treat approach to most people, I think this article should help clarify what I do and why. Also for the select few who have taught many tricks and wish to take their training to a new level, I share my approach. Whatever clicker approach you use, as long as it is effective, the parrot is learning, and you are both having fun in the process, it is already a major success.
Trained Parrot is a blog about how to train tricks to all parrots and parakeets. Read about how I teach tricks to Truman the Brown Necked Cape Parrot including flight recall, shake, wave, nod, turn around, fetch, wings, and play dead. Learn how you can train tricks to your Parrot, Parrotlet, Parakeet, Lovebird, Cockatiel, Conure, African Grey, Amazon, Cockatoo or Macaw. This blog is better than books or DVDs because the information is real, live, and completely free of charge. If you want to know how to teach your parrot tricks then you will enjoy this free parrot training tutorial.
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