- Hey guys, Jamieleigh here from Bird Tricks,
and in this video today I am going to show you the
many ways that I give my own flock of birds a bath.
Now I have birds all the way from small ones to large ones
like macaws and how I bathe them can really differ.
So, you're going to learn all the different ways that
I can not only bathe my birds but might be sharing some
great options for you to take home and do with
your own birds.
Plus it's going to be adorably cute footage.
Now, if your bird is terrified of taking a bath I'm
gonna share some tips and tricks for you to overcome that.
So, even if your bird is terrified of water or has had
a bad experience.
Don't worry there's going to be content in this video
to give you an honest solution.
(uplifting music)
All right, so since I live in a place that has four seasons
I can't always be giving my birds baths out in the sunshine
like I would prefer to do and like they would be
having in nature.
So I kind of have to make due with what I've got.
Now, a lot of bird owners have to bathe their birds
inside so hopefully this is helping a lot of you out.
One of my birds favorite ways to take a bath is with
a handy dandy shower perch.
Now you gotta know how to suction cup those
perches so that they stick and don't fall off
because a lot of times people go to use these
they put their bird on it, haven't secured it very well
and ka-bam and flop the perch has fallen off and
so has the bird, it can be a
very terrifying experience.
So make sure that you wet that silicone part
you really stick it on there and you make sure
and test it out before putting your bird on it.
Now my Macaws weigh about 950 grams each
so I can fit two of them on one shower perch
so I promise you they are sturdy and they are
awesome to use, you just gotta make sure they are
secured on well.
Now I don't actually usually remove mine
unless I'm going to thoroughly clean the side of my
shower and keep in mind that these suction cups do not
suction to every type of shower so usually they
work best with glass.
(falling water)
All right, I think you're good.
Birds do actually have different preferences
of the temperature of their shower just like humans.
I tend to scald myself and come out of showers and baths
with red marks on my skin because I like my shower
really hot, obviously you don't want to do that for
your birds.
So some birds may prefer a lukewarm shower
others may prefer that you're in the shower with them
and they're just getting the basic mist off of your back
and some may prefer cold showers like my African gray
Cressi.
This is the first time I've ever gotten Cressi
to shower in a real shower before.
(falling water)
What I did was I put her on the perch and then
I slowly, like crazy amounts of slowly turned on
the shower head to where it just barely went over the
end of the tip of the perch and then I turned it on a
little more as she got comfortable and then a little bit
more until it's just like this and this isn't full blast.
Ladies all done?
Ladies look pretty.
Another rule of thumb for getting your bird to bathe
is usually doing it earlier in the day can kind of
serve better, most birds don't want to go to bed wet
so they like doing it earlier in the day and
during the hottest time of the day.
So if you are keeping your bird in kind of a
cooler area that's maybe around 50 to 60 degrees
and it's not really digging it most likely a bird is
not going to want to get wet in those circumstances.
So keep in mind temperature is key not only for the
temperature of the water but the temperature of
their overall environment.
Woo weee,
We have fauna and bandit everybody's in this giant shower.
One of my sun conure's favorite ways to take a bath is
simply in my hands in the sink.
So I can be washing my hands and that's actually how
I discovered that they love this so much.
Is I would put my hands and go to wash them and my
sun conures would run from my shoulders down into
my hands and just into the cups of water that was
coming into my hands.
They love taking a bath like this,
they are also notorious for taking a bath
in their water dishes inside their enclosures.
In the water dish when they're in the mood.
They're like the water dish is doing this.
Get out of the water dish.
(laughter)
(chirping)
(whistling)
(chirping)
(laughter)
Another way that I tend to bathe my birds is
with a spray bottle, now in the winter months
I will actually put some really high quality
aloe mixed into the water so they are getting
that extra hydration into their skin and their
feathers making it look real good.
So a spray bath is something that all of my birds
enjoy except for my toucan.
He actually looks like he's starting to like it.
Kind of like perking up.
If he gets really into it I'll come back.
Stormy started liking the bath.
He made that noise when I pet him he made that noise
with the bath so.
Come on.
And Storm's talking about it because he just had his.
Now my Tuscan is kind of like my sun conures in the fact
that he loves to bathe himself and he uses a very big
water dish to do so.
Lots of birds prefer to do their own
self bathing in a dish so, you can put
multiple water dishes in a cage if that's the case
or put a handy dandy one that's a little bit more
shallow than normal where a bird can run around in
it and you don't have to worry about it going under.
What a good boy.
(spraying)
Good boy Razda good boy.
When the weather's awesome and I can actually get my
birds outdoors one of their favorite ways and
pretty much the only way for them to bathe other than
in their water dish is from the hose.
That's right, I actually get a hose and I spray down
my birds and they absolutely love it.
One of the ways that they have really learned to
love this is by me spraying the water over the actual
enclosure and it will drip down, start misting
and then they'll get really into it and come right
in front of the spray itself.
So giving my birds a bath through the hose
has been one of their all time favorites
especially on a nice hot day where they are
very thankful to cool down.
You're so wet buddy, you are, you want more?
(laughter)
Gotta stand further back cause I get splashed.
Morgan's watching, I don't know she looks like she
kind of wants to participate actually.
You can do this in a safe netted enclosure.
I have a batting net set up in my back yard
for this specifically.
Not only do I flight train in there
it's also a great space for me to be able to give
a spray or misting baths to some of my birds
on nice sunny days and not have to worry
about anything trying to get to them outside.
Some different ways to bathe your bird that I
didn't show in this video are offering it some
wet greens, now this is an notorious small bird
tactic like budgies and parrotlets and birds that
are of that size.
They really love rolling and rubbing themselves around on
soft wet greens.
This is what they would do in the wild
they would be walking into the grass and just
being able to get wet through the wetness in the grass.
So it's another really fun way and it's a great way
to kick in their instincts and get them bathing
and taking care of their plumage to
the utmost desirable capacity.
That was an interesting sentence.
All right, so what should you do if your bird
is terrified of water?
Now there are a bunch of different things
you can do depending on the severity of
your birds dislike for water.
Some birds have learned that the spray bottle is punishment
so the mere sound or sight of a spray bottle could
scare the bird.
There some distance where your bird is okay
with the spray bottle or the sound of water.
You need to find out what that distance is
and start clicking and rewarding and basically
training your bird to take a bath.
What I've done in the past is I've worked
with an Alexandrian parakeet who was unfortunately
his owners didn't know better at the time
they used a spray bottle as punishment to get the bird
to shut up or get the bird to obey them as they wanted.
So this bird had learned to really hate and dread
water as a whole.
So what I had to do was keep the spray
bottle in this room which was the kitchen
and living room all as one and I would put it
on the far end of the room so that it was in sight
but it was no where near determined a threat to this bird.
He got used to it for a few weeks of it just being
in the room and I would slowly move it around the room
closer and closer until I realized that no matter where
I put it he didn't have a problem or a reaction to it.
What I was looking for mostly is a non-reaction
to the spray bottle.
Then I would start using the spray bottle every so often
in the kitchen area, and I would just spray the wall
or spray it into the sink just once and I would wait
for him to be calm and I would go over, click a clicker
and give a reward.
Now instead of clicking a clicker if you don't know
what a clicker is or you've never used one you can simply
say the word good and go over and give a treat reward.
You can either drop it into a dish or hand it to your
bird depending on how tame your bird is.
The next thing I would do is I would just increase the
amount of times I would spray or how much the bird was
paying attention.
So if the bird was eating a meal and I sprayed the
spray bottle and it didn't care, it was kind of getting
reinforcement in that moment.
But if the bird looked bored or maybe was just watching
you and trying to make sure what you were doing
and you had your birds full attention then you spray
the spray bottle and you got no reaction that deserves
a jackpot reward until that becomes the new normal.
So what you're really going for is the bird not
reacting to the sound and sight of the spray bottle.
Eventually when you can get close enough spraying that
spray bottle where the bird sees that there's a little
bit of mist, it hears it and it now anticipates receiving
a treat for not reacting to it is what you really want.
When your bird finally shows that it's anticipating that
a reward is coming that's when you know they're really
starting to understand the training.
The next thing you can do is as I have demo'd in some
of my other YouTube videos of getting birds over the fear
of water and spray bottle starts to spray closer and closer
to them and make sure you shoot that spray bottle nice and
high so that they sound happens but then just a few
seconds later the trickle of the actual water happens.
It's not happening at the same time.
You don't want to spray your bird right in the face and have
it get hit with water and try to train that because
it's going to be such shock you're going to get nothing
but a huge reaction.
So make sure you have the sound and then a few seconds
later the trickle of the water comes down.
Simply click and reward if your bird either gives a bathing
response which would be lifting of the feathers and
kind of fluffing up and shaking or just ignores it
completely, anything that isn't a huge reaction.
And you will keep continuing to train from there until
your bird no longer cares about the water but actually
anticipates the water coming because it knows that means
it's favorite treat.
Make sure you keep these sessions short,
you always end on a positive note and
before long your bird will be enjoying bathing because
it will have paired it with the sensation of receiving
its favorite treat.
Eventually when I trained this with
Rasa an Alexandrian Parakeet the bathing became
so self rewarding that he no longer needed the treat
which is the primary goal.
If you tried this tactic and it worked for you please
let me know in the comments how long it took,
what treat you used and what type of bird you have.
This will help other bird owners have a realistic
expectation of how long this training can take
and how well worth it it is.
Just in case any of you were wondering where I got my
handy dandy lefty pen, he is a green quaker parrot
I did a pin collaboration with Hyper Finch on Instagram
and these are available for between $9 need $10 with free
shipping from Australia so go ahead I will leave a
link in the description if you would like to get them
100% of our profits from these pins goes to rescue birds
so you'll be supporting them and you'll look really cute.
Hey guys when I went to edit this I had a realization of
one very important thing that I completely forgot
to mention about getting your bird to bathe
successfully and that is noise.
I know it seems like a really odd thing but in the
rain forest when a storm is coming there is a lot of
pre-stuff that happens that kind of creates the ambiance
for birds to get ready to bathe and this happens in
numerous different environments in the wild.
And so, it kind of makes sense that it transfers to our
own pet birds at home.
One of the things that really turns birds into the mood
to take a bath is the noise of a vacuum or a steam cleaner
or something like that who knows exactly why it does it
for some birds and not for others but for my own birds
the vacuum does not work the vacuum trick does not work.
However; it's a very popular one among bird owners
that does work in getting their birds to want to
bathe.
What works for me is actually when I go to steam clean
my aviaries.
Anytime they hear that steam cleaner going they all
want to take a bath.
Obviously they can't with a steam cleaner but
it makes it so that I can easily stop what I'm doing
get a spray bottle and make sure that I get them
wet while they are in the mood to bathe.
Bathing your bird as often as possible is really ideal
so that their feather care is at the utmost and their
plumage looks amazing.
Some of the ways that I do this may transfer to your birds
or may not it's really about finding what your birds
preference of temperature is of the water, temperature
is of the environment and as far as time of day it's
more likely to want to take a bath.
Now I try to offer my birds bathing opportunities every
single day, do they always take me up on that?
No, however; I do try to at least make it available
to them so that they have that opportunity to keep
themselves nice and clean.
It's super important to also note that you never want
to use any sort of shampoos or soaps on your bird.
All they need is fresh, clean water, so any sort of
products that are advertising putting any kind of soap
in there will actually damage the feathers and make your
bird over-preen to try to get it clean.
So shampoo although we use it is not good or ideal for
your bird, so please use nothing but straight water unless
ever told by your avian vet to use something else.
The only thing I have ever added to my birds water baths
is aloe spray, not really aloe spray, aloe in the spray.
Get what I'm saying.
I would love to hear from you guys in the comments below
of how your bird prefers to take it's bath.
What's its favorite method out of the ones I showed you
or maybe use a different method that's not shown in this
video, love to hear from you and leaving a comment always
helps other bird owners come up with ideas for how to enrich
their birds lives so please don't be afraid to leave a
comment down below and share your experience with me.
As always if you find this content helpful please go
ahead and hit that thumbs up button, share and
subscribe to the channel