- Will you stay with me for this video?
Don't ditch me.
You look like you want to ditch me.
Okay, before Barry leaves me,
I have 11 parrot owner hacks that I cannot wait
to share with you in this video.
Hey, you stayed for the whole intro.
Thanks, Barry.
Do you wanna stay the rest of the video?
Love you.
Just gonna go with it.
Don't ditch me.
Ah, she ditched.
That's fine.
Did know it was coming.
She'd rather be eating.
(upbeat music)
Parrot owner life hack number one is having a mini vacuum.
My mini vacuum, I keep in my laundry room
on a little charger, but this thing comes in so handy
especially picking up after my little Budgie blueberry
and all of her tiny little molted feathers every single day.
She makes quite the mess around her cage
because I primarily use her cage for just feeding
and any time that she just needs to be locked
up for safety reasons.
If we're cooking or there's something
that she can't be a part of, then she's in her cage.
But otherwise, she's actually a cageless Budgie,
which is super cool and very,
very fun to have around our house.
This mini vacuum is fantastic for picking up
all those tiny little feathers
that you find around the house.
My second parrot owner hack is my pressure washer.
I discovered a whole new world when I got a pressure washer.
Now when I use a regular hose
I think what's wrong with this thing?
Why isn't it working?
My pressure washer is something that I use
to be able to clean all of my aviaries super duper well
because they can get caked with pellet powder and poop
and all sorts of things that these birds seem to produce
that come out of nowhere.
Overnight my cages get really disgusting,
so being able to take a pressure washer to them saves
so much time for me.
It's also such a safe way to clean all of my parrot cages
since parrots are so sensitive
to any sort of cleaning material beyond vinegar or F10.
Hack number three is actually a barbecue scraper.
I know it sounds kind of crazy
and you can also use paint scrapers as well,
but I ended up stealing my husband's barbecue scraper.
Which don't worry, he never got it back.
And I use this to scrape the grates
of all of our travel cages
'cause we use big cages in our travel trailer for our birds.
We try to make sure that they're really tall
so that our birds' tails stay nice
and clean when we're traveling.
And this scraper allows me to really get
to those hard-to-reach spots
and get them as clean as possible.
So I find it very handy.
Number four, this is a combination
of a lot of different things and having them handy,
but I like using shop paper towels
because they're very absorbent.
Kleenex, unscented baby wipes,
Oh my gosh, those are my go-to for cleaning off surfaces
that need a little extra moisture to do so.
I also keep regular paper towels
and back when my daughter was a baby
we used reusable diapers and I still have those
and I use them as reusable rags
and they're just really great for cleaning things
and especially doing so with something
that I'm not super attached to.
You know, 'cause it was a diaper.
But all these things are fantastic
for cleaning bowls, dishes, poop off
of pretty much any surface.
So I keep these all around.
Even here in my house, I have a bunch
of nooks and crannies where I keep wet wipes
and those are under the sink.
I have them in a little nook in a cabinet.
I have Kleenex out on display for that reason.
And I have my paper towels.
So I have these, a combination of all of these things
in easy to reach places that are always accessible
whether I'm traveling or I'm staying home
or just working in my various bird care rooms.
Number five is super cool.
For those of you that have lots of birds
you know that they molt often.
I'm always finding feathers everywhere, every single day.
And then when it's molting season
you're getting a ton of feathers.
So I actually keep these feathers and I either donate them
to veterinary schools, which I've done before.
Artists, there's various artists that like
to make amazing creations with feathers.
There's also a lot of tribes that like to use these types
of feathers for celebration purposes.
That's not the word I'm looking for,
but I'm sure you guys will leave it in the comments,
what I'm going for that I've been asked for.
And then also fishermen.
Some fishermen really enjoy specific feathers
especially from when I had my toucan.
They like a specific type of feather for fly fishing
so it feels really good to be able to keep these feathers
and utilize them for various donations.
Lately I've been able to donate feathers
for imping procedures on other birds
who have unfortunately, or sadly, been clipped
and are looking for a new set of feathers.
So it's been really,
really amazing to give back in that way.
So I highly encourage you to hang onto those feathers
and get creative with who could use them.
Number six is actually
getting newspaper donated from schools.
So where my daughter goes to school
they always give me a huge basket full
of newspapers that have been given
to them that they're then passing on to me
and I use them in our travel cages
and it's so nice not to have to buy paper to put
in the bottom of those cages.
So a really awesome hack is getting donated newspaper.
Number seven and definitely one of my favorite hacks
is having a bird dish designated dishwasher.
We found a tiny one,
but it's so perfect for all the bird dishes.
We used to intermix the bird dishes
with our dishes and it got really gross.
My husband was constantly grossed out about it,
especially because the pellet dust,
or sometimes there's seasonal feeding mix,
would just really get on all of our other dishes
and nothing would ever feel quite 100% clean.
So having a bird designated dishwasher has made a huge world
of difference for the care that I can provide for our birds.
The other thing I like to throw
in the bird designated dishwasher
is their perches for cleaning.
Now I don't have to use my dishwasher
to get that accomplished, which feels really nice.
So having a bird designated dishwasher, highly recommend.
My eighth parrot owner hack is actually
using those little metal toys
for all of the toy parts that accumulate.
Sometimes my birds might knock down a big chunk of toy
where I feel like it could be wasteful
to just throw that away.
So I actually break it into multiple pieces
and put it in these little reusable toys
and am able to serve it to my birds again in a new way,
which is really, really fun
and feels like recycling of parrot toy parts.
So anytime you can utilize little toys
or something where you can restring them
or reuse them or even convert them
into a foot toy for your bird, definitely do it.
It's a new form of stimulation and really great
in engaging for the bird to see that toy in a different way.
My ninth parrot owner hack is using feathers
for Christmas ornaments or other keepsakes.
This is something that we did one year that has stayed
with us every single year and been so, so special.
I actually did it over on Patreon,
one of the first years that I ever led Patreon.
I made these really beautiful ornaments
with various feathers from my flock inside
and they were so gorgeous.
I should have kept more for myself.
And then since then, Capri and I
have done various art projects
where we have Christmas ornaments that are a representation
of our flock using their feathers, which is super fun.
And every year it's really special
because we have the whole year to forget
that we even did it.
You can also make a lot of custom jewelry from feathers
and there's tons of people on Etsy that are quite skillful
and I've actually messaged quite a few
of them where you can mail them specific feathers
to make their amazing creations out of.
So another great reason to keep your bird's feathers.
Number 10 is butcher paper rolls.
I get asked about this all the time.
I personally use Uline
and I get giant rolls of butcher paper
and I had them made basically by some handy guys.
I had them put
on custom racks where I can just pull the paper through
and and then cut off whatever I don't need.
And it's really, really amazing.
Butcher paper is stronger
than newspaper and it's less absorbent
so everything kind of stays on top instead of getting mushy
and ripping and being a total mess of a disaster.
So these butcher paper rolls have made my life
of cleaning up after my birds a lot simpler.
And lastly, the 11th and last parrot owner hack
is actually keeping target sticks, clickers, and treats
in all of the easily accessible places in your house
so that you're not running up and freaking your bird out
by going and getting these things.
I like to leave them in drawers
in the kitchen 'cause I'm often in the kitchen
or on a little tabletop that I have in the living room.
I have friends who have them almost
on display around their house in various areas.
Just having them around and easily accessible will make it
so that every interaction is truly a training session.
And you can get yourself outta dodge if you really need to.
If your bird's acting out or you find yourself getting bit
and having a terrible interaction, you can grab a treat
and get yourself out of that situation
or maybe target your bird away from that situation.
It just really comes in handy
for being able to have a positive way to get yourself
out of an otherwise not so positive interaction.
So I hope you guys enjoyed my 11 parrot owner hacks.
Let me know what your hacks are
in the comments so that I can learn from you as well.
And then tell me what your favorite hack has been
from this list.
And maybe you guys already do some of them too.
I'm sure parrot owner to parrot owner,
we totally have some of the same things,
but everybody's situation is completely different
and so it's always nice to hear what other people do.
I know that a lot of people have super cool hacks
for keeping areas clean around their bird cage.
So if you have those, share them.
We all wanna learn from each other
and I'm sure that next year I could come up
with a ton of totally different hacks
that I maybe wasn't using this year.
So we're always evolving.
Leave all your ideas in the comments
so that somebody who maybe has the same species
of bird as you or lives a similar lifestyle
can learn from what you guys do.
And again, let me know which hack
was your ultimate favorite hack.
See you guys in the next video.
(light music)