Large Toy Suggestions for Macaw?

[Scott]

How about getting untreated lumber off cuts or sanitizing heavy branches for the macaw to tear up? You can stick them through cage bars or drill with a heavy drill bit and hang from stainless steel chain, like stuff you save from previously devoured toys.

My Meyers parrot who is likely much smaller than your big guy likes one of the bigger parrot/ macaw toys from Chewy brand. It has big wooden beads and 2-2” chunks of food-dyed wood strung on heavy cotton rope (mop-type string).

It sounds like this is a big bird that wants to chew and is chewing up small commercIal bird toys.

I would also wonder about dog rawhide toys for your macaw to chew up. Maybe you could ask a vet about this? Or you could get these toys and bake in your oven, like I do with big branches that I will use for perches (after soaking and scrubbing).

I have some coconut halves that were drink cups. I bet those would be fun to chew up. I have soaked and rinsed and baked pine cones for my birds, too. They are smaller but they enjoy tearing them up and pine cones are free.

Big bird toys are expensive! But you can make some.

Like Heather G said, get some lumber cut offs. Go to your local Home Depot, introduce yourself to the lumber manager, ask if you can take the cut offs from their scraps barrels, taking only clear pine cut offs from like 2X4's. He will likely be very glad as it saves the store from the labor of removing it, saves them space and money in the dumpster. Sweeten the deal with some nice big color phots of your macaw for them to hang up ( showing him chewing that lumber). Betcha your toy parts are free. All you need is a drill and some sisal rope. THe parrot will not care if they are colored or not!

Lumber a great idea if your mac is a voracious chewer! My cockatoos buzz through so much wood I purchase ten-foot sections of 2 x 4 and cut into one-foot pieces. Drill hole through center and hang with stainless steel chain.

 

[Shez]

So, I have some toys for my harlequin macaw, Kiwi but they aren't really big enough for her and she manages to shred them right away. Does anyone have a favourite toy company or specific toy they like? I'm aware I need to switch out the toys for enrichment purposes and I did a ton of research on unsafe toys such as happy huts and rope toys. I'm also trying to find good foraging toys, chewing toys, exercise toys, puzzles and manipulative toys, and foot toys (I'll just get perches but if anyone knows of any actual 'foot toys' mention them please!) Any other kinds of toys I missed would be appreciated too! I have her cage all set up now. She has her own room! I just need to stock the cage with better toys. And I understand toys are supposed to be shredded but she shreds them completely within the same day I get them. She only has about four hours of staggered cage time right now but idk I might be totally wrong. Anyway thanks for all the help with Kiwi so far!

Mine and my macaws favorite toys (foot, hanging and side mount toys) all come from a store called seriously nutz- they specialise in macaw toys. Unfortunately it costs me an arm and a leg to have them shipped from the USA to Aus so we can only get them like once a year. I honestly can not with good conscience recommend any other toys for macaws- my boy kills literally everything within seconds of it being hung (cage bar welds are not even safe around my boy) and her toys last him well all while keeping him completely fascinated and entertained the whole time, he also can not (or does not) drop them straight away like he has done with every other toy I have purchased him. If I can not get seriously nutz toys for him then I have to make his toys myself or I am just paying a fortune for him to have literally 10 seconds play time.

Be very careful getting timber offcuts unless you can trust who you're getting them from or can easily tell what is and what isn't untreated- I had hardware guys try to send me home with free treated pine offcuts while telling me they were not treated.
It is not very expensive to buy a non treated pine length of timber and cut it your self or have the hardware people do it for you.
Also, please do not offer anything rawhide- the process for making it is most often full of horrid chemicals- I wont even offer rawhide to my dog who wont touch the stuff anyhow. Rawhide is a pretty gross thing really but you could try to locate some vegetable tanned leather which many macs love and if it is vegetable tanned then it is totally safe.

 

[HeatherG]

Mine and my macaws favorite toys (foot, hanging and side mount toys) all come from a store called seriously nutz- they specialise in macaw toys. Unfortunately it costs me an arm and a leg to have them shipped from the USA to Aus so we can only get them like once a year. I honestly can not with good conscience recommend any other toys for macaws- my boy kills literally everything within seconds of it being hung (cage bar welds are not even safe around my boy) and her toys last him well all while keeping him completely fascinated and entertained the whole time, he also can not (or does not) drop them straight away like he has done with every other toy I have purchased him. If I can not get seriously nutz toys for him then I have to make his toys myself or I am just paying a fortune for him to have literally 10 seconds play time.

Be very careful getting timber offcuts unless you can trust who you're getting them from or can easily tell what is and what isn't untreated- I had hardware guys try to send me home with free treated pine offcuts while telling me they were not treated.
It is not very expensive to buy a non treated pine length of timber and cut it your self or have the hardware people do it for you.
Also, please do not offer anything rawhide- the process for making it is most often full of horrid chemicals- I wont even offer rawhide to my dog who wont touch the stuff anyhow. Rawhide is a pretty gross thing really but you could try to locate some vegetable tanned leather which many macs love and if it is vegetable tanned then it is totally safe.

Good to know. I was not sure about the rawhide chews for dogs. That’s why I suggested you ask the vet about it.

I think you can buy untreated pine shims in a dozen or 50 pack, but I am not sure if those are big enough for a big macaw. They would be adequate for my Meyers parrot if i wedged them in cage bars or if I drilled a big hole through and strung them on clean rope or clean stainless steel chain.

I also just gave the Meyers parrot a big wooden spoon to chew up. I see some bulk bird biscuits-wafers of colored wood about 3” long—for sale on eBay.