Foraging Semi-Success

[Printer bird]

I adopted Dipper, my WCP, about a month ago. She's a great bird and is fitting in well but is pretty chill in her cage. I want to make sure she is not bored and have been experimenting a bit with toys and foraging to encourage her to be active in her cage. So far the only "toy" that she plays with in her cage is plain paper, which is nice and cheap, so not the end of the world. She does like to eat so I wrapped some pellets in paper today and stuck it in for a foraging activity. I was excited when she started ripping into the middle of it. Had she done this type of foraging before? She got to the pellets at the centre pretty quickly and then...kept destroying the paper, essentially ignoring the pellets and letting them tumble to the bottom of the cage. Ha on me. Will keep trying this, though, as she has lots of food, I just want to motivate her to play so if the pellet piñata at least gets her excited about ripping something up, its enough for me. Any good foraging success stories out there?

 

[wrench13]

We wrap a few pine nuts into a coffee filter roll it up like a joint and then weave it through the bars of Salty's cage.

 

[chris-md]

Yep! Even caught it on camera. I kept it insanely simple for him so he can build some confidence. The first time I tried to make him forage I simply covered his food bowl with a paper towel. Not secured, just placed it on top while I was at work....he didn't eat all day, couldn't understand to pull the paper towel off.

[ame="https://youtu.be/KztWdrv4KsY"]Parker the eclectus' first foraging success - YouTube[/ame]

 

[Printer bird]

Thanks for the tips! We had trouble getting Dipper to even scope out an almond bit left on the couch so I might have to try the toilet paper roll trick, Chris! Parker is so cute.

Thanks also for the great suggestion, Wrench! I haven't yet tried pine nuts but she's pretty good at trying/eating most things so I'm sure they'll be fun.

She also played on a TOY today for the first time (that I've seen). It made me super excited to know that she's starting to goof around a bit. yay!

 

[bill_e]

Great! Nike, who we've had since December, is just starting to tear apart some hanging toys. I've tried the toilet paper roll trick but so far no success.

 

[coopedup]

Im sitting here reading and laughing about all the complex foraging toys I bought for Liesl, who is still a baby. Maybe she'll get to use them in a few years.

 

[Kiwibird]

Kiwi picked up foraging pretty quickly after we adopted him (he is a zon though and natural pig lol). We started with simple toys. Now we own almost every puzzle foraging toy on the market and he's aced them all. Even remembers how to solve them after months of them not being in his cage. I don't know what to do with him

Just keep on offering simple foraging options then advance. Foraging is instinctual for parrots and most pick it up quickly! It's a great way to entertain them and to offer some of their less healthy favorites (like seed) in small quantities.

 

[Weezerj]

I stuff almonds into vine balls. Keeps Loki entertained for an hour or so.