None of which tells us whether it is ethical, which is the question of the original post.
As evidence, I present the behavior variously known as “kitty crazies,” “midnight crazies,” and “cat zoomies.” The cat will dash madly around the house, sometimes knocking things over. Now, do outdoor or feral cats do this? They probably don’t need to, because their range of natural activities fulfills the same psychological need. I am of the opinion that this is a mental health issue for indoor cats, similar to the phenomenon that humans call “stir crazy.” There needs to be far more research into feline mental health, and especially comparing indoor-only cats with cats who have access to outdoors.
Is it common for tags to have no numbers or individual markings? And to be visibly shaped like a strap that encompasses both the radius and the metacarpals? And does a pinioned wing still have visible full-length primaries, but just simply remain partly bent when the other wing fully straightens? I have seen pinioned birds, and this was different.
Besides, I am sure you are aware that there is controversy over whether pinioning really is “with no harm,” since it is the anatomical equivalent of cutting off all the fingers except for the thumb.
I am BEGGING people to stop using the ethics of humans dealing with other humans and a heavy dose of anthropomorphism to talk about animals and maybe also, have a pet cat before they claim that cat such as mine who lives inside is sick in the head and “unethical” because he is barely over a year old, still very energetic, and runs around the house at 5 in the morning sometimes when he wants to play and nobody is awake to entertain him because I think letting my cat outside to “preform natural behaviors” and kill endangered migratory warblers and then get killed by a coyote or a car going 40 in a residential zone is actually way less ethical lmao
this is not at all to say the original topic at hand (captive parrots) is entirely 100% rooted in this or whatever on the off chance it comes across like that to anyone because wow if this hasn’t strayed far from that and I think there is a major difference between “a lot of parrots have social, dietary, and enrichment needs that are hard for most people to meet and also there is a bit of a nasty underbelly to aviculture with poaching being a thing that does happen even if the majority of captive birds are captive bred” and “indoor cats are mentally ill and all captive animals are unethical”
I think the problem is that if we assume good husbandry and unproblematic sourcing as the original posts invites us to, there isn’t much that differentiates birds from any other potential pet, so the discussion turns to pet keeping in the abstract. “It might take a lot more than you’d think to meet their needs so it might not be practical” doesn’t feel like a satisfying answer to an ethical question.
If it has nothing to do with original question, then people who try to make pets a new addition to human society shouldn’t use their wrong facts.
Cats being active at night is normal, both for outdoors and indoors, that’s not a sign of mental health issues, that is not only a reach but implying indoor cats are unhealthy which is not correct, how is that unhealthy to release energy, that is in fact the opposite, it would be bad for their mental health if they weren’t active at nights. Cats are very much studied animals from all possible aspects.
I mean, there is a big difference between cats and parrots as pets. I don’t think they’re really comparable. Cats are domesticated and have been selected to benefit from being involved with people, to be amenable to human interaction, and so on. You don’t really have ‘wild cats’ the same way you do wild parrots since cats will not survive without human interaction (directly or indirectly via living feral near human settlements). Same with dogs, pigeons, most other domestic animals.
Parrots are wild animals that do not have any inherent benefit to being kept captive. If you are giving a parrot everything it needs to thrive in captivity it is barely a pet, more like a zoo animal. The difference between parrots and any other exotic is their extreme care needs, and while it’s not hard to provide a school of neon tetras or a bearded dragon what they need to thrive, it’s still more for the owner’s benefit than the animal’s in most cases. I say this as someone who has had many fish and insects that aren’t domesticated, it’s a completely different ballgame. Keeping parrots may be common but I think it is more comparable to keeping a fox, or an arapima, or a burmese python, or one of many hard-to-keep exotics.
I’m not sure where I stand on the ethics of it all. I don’t think parrots should be as common as they are as pets and I don’t think most people take good enough care of them, even if they try. I think people are confusing ethics and morality here.
While that’s technically true, the accuracy of the information a person provides does give insight into the quality of other information or opinions they may form and espouse. Very broadly speaking, the less accurate the information a person uses as their sources the less impact their arguments have.
And if you maintain that it isn’t relevant to the discussion, then you also have to admit that you bringing it up as a topic of discussion was also irrelevant, yet you did so.
For my money, it’s no more and no less ethical than keeping any other pet or domesticated animal (or potentially plant). Each specific species, and in some cases each individual animal, is a unique case; some it is (in my opinion) deeply unethical, in others it may actually be a benefit for the individual in question.
Personally, I don’t keep pets animals at present, my lifestyle doesn’t allow me to provide what I would consider an appropriate living situation for them, so I don’t do it.
Wild parrots live in flocks? Solitary confinement with a human can’t be good for the bird (unless it is a rescue and its quality of life improves)
In the wild a varied diet, as a pet dependent on what is given. Could cause health and disease issues.
What sort of distance would a wild parrot fly in a day? How will a pet bird be able to achieve that sort of exercise, as opposed to flying round and round a room or an aviary.
Just a reminder to please keep the conversation focused on the original question (which asks specifically about parrots) and avoid straying too far off course into other topics, such as the ethics of pet cats outdoors, which is a discouraged topic. Please also remember to focus on discussing ideas (not specific individuals or users), and work from the assumption that other folks mean well.
Welcome to the Forum, albeit to a somewhat fractious topic.
I believe your point about a “knowledgeable and committed keeper” I think gets to the heart of the ethical question. Parrots are complex beings as they get larger, and enrichment may be hard to provide - it takes knowledge and commitment to provide for their larger needs. As a radical example, if I were to keep a liver fluke for a pet, but not provide it with a suitable habitat (i.e. a living body to find a living space) it would quickly die. I don’t believe that is ethical. A large parrot has complicated social and mental needs that one may not be able or willing to provide. Even budgies behave oddly when confined and deprived of social contact. The further animals get from humans, the less we know their needs. Food and safety are not merely enough. So for that reason, I would say that keeping larger parrots is not ethical. Where to draw that line though, I do not know. As I have stated, domestic budgies seem to live a decent life if allowed a bit of leeway. As for the rest of the parrots, I don’t know what their needs are.
I used to work in a large animal shelter for wild and exotic animals in Germany. In the exotic area we had a lot of birds as well. It was extremly saddening how psychologically disturbed a lot of those were. While there are some people that really try to go all the way in trying to provide a perfect life for their parrots (and other birds), it proves to be extremely hard, costly and in many cases just not possible for the average person. Its different with other exotic animals like reptiles and fish, so I am a bit more torn there, but birds are among the common pets that are hardest or impossible to keep adequatly… and a lot of people do not even seriously try to reach that goal, starting with not considering social needs. I am against keeping parrots.
I’m somewhat in that stance because many people I’m sure you have noticed work in a shelter for exotic and wild animals, most people glamourise having parrots and then realise (almost always too late) that these intelligent creatures need a LOT of attention and mental stimulation.
We had some, but Cockatoos that optically looked fine but had other issues.
I think one of the worst cases was a red-and-green macaw with a body that was completely naked and it never crew back. This one was once moved to a zoo (all exotic pets would not go back to private owner, but only to official places), which I thought was very brave by the zoo to take in such a ill looking individual which could reflect badly on the zoo. However, it had to move back with us after killing anything eaqual sized… With us it was living with some smaller birds (amazons, smaller aras, sometimes cockatoos as well). With us this one was always screaming like crazy when the light was switched of at night, it hated the dark.
…in its earlier life it had been living in a cellar on top of a washing maschine… cannot imagine.
But we had many, many other birds that were crazy in one or another way. Like a small meyers parrot that attacked everyone when we tried to clean the room. Or a amazona that fell in love with me but hated on anyone (or anybird) else that would come too close too me… this one was also missing some bones in the wings, so it would never be able to fly. It was so sad for this one that it never managed to socialize with other birds and I was of course not always around… like no human ever can for an animal. It´s just sad.
I think it’s ethical to keep captive-bred birds as pets, assuming they are cared for well. (They’re often not.) They should never be released because they can establish invasive populations.
I think wild birds should never be captured to keep as pets.
Captive-bred large parrots are, for me, a gray area. Properly caring for them is really difficult because they can live so long and form such strong bonds to a person. Also, their needs for stimulation ca be hard to meet.
I would think long and hard before getting any pet, especially a bird. A bird’s needs can be pretty demanding, they can be loud, and they often live a very long time (like, bird care will be in your will long). But if you do decide to get a bird, get a rescue. They’re are lots of birds than need homes after their previous owners found them to be too much.
How ethical your pet ownership is will depend on you more than the type of pet.
If you go that route, though, you have a higher likelihood of encountering a bird that has already been messed up, and therefore has even more exacting needs than usual.
This thread reminds me of Parrot Mountain, in Tennessee almost next door to Dollywood. Most of the birds there have signs warning not to try to touch or interact with them – they are birds who came to the sanctuary with issues.