Cockatiel
From UASWiki
Many people purchase or otherwise obtain Cockatiels for companionship. These friendly easy going birds make great pets and companions, and can be very entertaining. Some birds can learn to talk, which really is a mimic of voice. Others can and do learn complex whistles and chirps, and there are tapes and CD's available with training songs, words and whistles that can assist an owner to teach his or her's bird to perform. Cockatiels survive in about the same environment as humans, and while they can tollerate both lower and higher temperatures that would make humans uncomfortable, generally what we consider comfortable is likely to feel the same for them. As an experiment, I have a flock of 14 Cockatiels, 8 of the birds are the offspring of my first parents. I was interested in learning how cockatiels behaved when both captive and when staying with their parents rather than being able to leave the parents and start their own family. I must say, I have learned quite a bit about their behavior, and while I do plan to keep them all together, I'm not sure it's the right thing to do. The offspring do stay bonded to their parents, and while not bonded to people, they are socialized and we have no trouble handling any of them for the most part. There are little quirks about each and every one that makes that particular cockatiel's personality uniquely different from every other bird. All of this flock are fully flighted and have their own bird room they reside in, however they also have full access to the entire house. It does present some problems with dust control and cleanliness throughout the house, but it certainly is a managable task. One of the largest aspects of keeping cockatiels in captivity is providing enough room for them to fly, exercise and yet still be able to be contained. There are pros and cons about keeping the birds flighted, and I happen to fall in the group that fully believes they should be flighted, both for their physical health and their mental status. some of the cons of being fully flighted in captivity is the fact that everyone who enters and leaves a protected or safe area where birds are lose is a potential route of escape into the wild. Yet another is the birds can get into places that make it difficult or unsafe for the bird to be there. It usually winds up being a matter of personal preference and taking in the whole situation including the birds overall health, its ability to harm themselves or being able to maintain control of things. No one set of conditions works for everyone.
With respect to cockatiel's diets, We provide our birds a varied diet which includes a high quality seed mix that contains sunflower seeds, red and brown millet, canary grass seed, oat groats ground wheat and the list goes on and on. The cockatiels seem to thrive quite well on this seed mix, but in order to provide them with even more variety, we feed them cooked wheat berries, cooked popcorn seed, cooked green peas, and soybeans. Their diet also includes just about any type of table food we eat, including fried chicken, pork chops, beef, seafoods, vegetables, rice as well as whole wheat bread and whole wheat cereals like cheerios and bran. The flock gets spray millet each and every day. The whole idea behind a healthy diet actually stems from a large variety of healthy foods. The flock gets at least one annual vet visit for a "well birdie" checkup, as well as visits propted by possible illness or behavior that is out of the normal. There are numerous diseases and ailments that can strike cockatiels, some of which are very difficult to cure, and some which can only be controlled. Their health is of utmost importance as it would be very easy for one infected bird to contaminate the whole flock which could possibly wipe the entire flock out in very short order.
Cockatiels can be very damaging to objects in and around your house. They are notoriously known for chewing on things, and the materials available in the average home are ripe for chewing by most birds. It is very important to prevent them from gaining access to materials that could potentially kill them or make them very sick. Some of those items would be any type of chemical, some furniture finishes, wiring on appliances or lamps, paints and finishes, and any type of food that they are forbidden to have such as chocolate, avacodo, caffene and certain types of wood. Making a house bird-safe can be a daunting task, but it can and must be done if you want to keep your companion healthy and safe.
In the next discussion, I will attempt to provide some guidelines on bird behavior.
