Dealing with Bird Poop

User Question
I owned a store bought parakeet when I was a teen for 4 years. I let a friend keep him in college while out of town, & he mysteriously died. That was 6 years ago & I've really been wanting another budgie. However, the one I had before wanted nothing to do with me, but was precious & content as long as I left him alone.

My wife & I just moved to Louisville, Ky. Do you know of any hand raised breeders here?

Also, everybody just seems to be able to let the bird fly around & play outside the cage...I never accomplished this with Marley. So, if I get to that point, is there a way to 'potty train' or a good time to know when to let them out? How do I know if they're on my shoulder or head they won't poop on me? If there are no breeders, do store bought budgies acutally ever come around to talk & play? Can you help me out, please? Thank you so much.

Lisa's Answer
I'm sorry to hear about Marley! It's hard to trust any 3rd party with your pet, and really know the pet is safe. Hopefully your new keet will do much better!

I don't know of any breeders in Kentucky, your best bet is to find a quality pet store and ask them. They should know who the breeders in the area are.

I have lots of pages on my site on step by step hand training, so if you follow those, then sure, even store bought budgies will become tame and finger-trained.

I had to laugh about the poop question. You need to understand something here. Parakeets poop. It's what they do. They don't do it on a schedule or only in certain locations. If they're ready to poop, they will. Poop is just a little dry circle of digested seed. We're not talking dog poop here. You ARE going to get poop on your fingers, your shoulders, your hair at times. You flick it off. It's like having a kid and then obsessing about having fingerprints on the walls. It's just what happens. You wipe it off, life goes on.

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