Harlequin Parakeet and Poops

User Question
I just bought a Fancy (Harlequin maybe) parakeet, and am wondering if my birds droppings are supposed to look like that of, say a seagull. Because my care book said that runny poop is bad, but i cant tell if its runny or not - I live in the Pacific Northwest, so the poop just looks normal to me. Is it?

Lisa's Answer
Well first, a real Harlequin parakeet comes from India and isn't the traditional Australian parakeet. That is, it's not a small bird with black and white striped feathers and a reasonably solid colored body. A harlequin parakeet has no stripes at all, even on his wings. He has solid wings, a solid colored head, a big red beak and usually a ring around the neck. So caring for one would be different in many ways than caring for the Australian budgie parakeet that you see photos of all over my site.

So if that's the case, the poops could be quite normal for a harlequin. Also, any birds that are fed a good fresh food diet with greens and veggies will have soggy poops. That's "normal" for them, as compared to the hard, dried poops of a seed-only bird.

I have a page on parakeet poop here -

http://www.lisashea.com/petinfo/articles/bird_poop.html

But other than that, the best person to talk to is your bird vet. He or she could make sure your bird is healthy and you can go from there!

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