• Welcome to Avian Avenue! To view our forum with less advertisments please register with us.
    Memberships are free and it will just take a moment. Click here

I am nutz to consider getting a dog when I have an Eclectus?

CaliEckies

Jogging around the block
Avenue Veteran
Joined
9/4/12
Messages
653
Location
Florida
I have 5 dogs and none of my parrots are caged- and they are all flighted. If I leave the home the birds are kept separate of the dogs. I have adopted both older and younger birds. If you have control over your dogs I dont see the issue. I wouldnt recommend to bring in an adult or older dog only a young dog you can train to leave the birds alone.
 

jfish930

Meeting neighbors
Avenue Veteran
Joined
3/27/12
Messages
41
Location
Pittsburgh
Real Name
Joel
Just wanted to send an update. We have now had our Mini Golden Doodle (Killian) for about 6 months and we have not had one problem in regards to our Sophie (female Eclectus)) and Killian getting along. I can't say they interact; they merely tolerate each other.

As I had mentioned, Sophie has her cage door open all day as long as I am home and she is usually quite content to hang our on top of her door or her playtop. I tend to pick her up and place her on my shoulder every hour or so for 10-20 minutes at a time. My biggest concern before getting a dog was when Sophie does choose to fly across the room (she only does this if frightened by a rabbit or deer in the yard and she is not the most skilled at choosing a landing spot) I didn't want a dog chasing after her or worse. Well, Sophie has flown across the living room several times with the dog in the room and the dog merely looks at me or my wife with a puzzled expression on his face. I have yelled "stay" or "sit" to him at times when this happens, but he doesn't move anyway. I think this could be because the first day we brought the dog home (Killian was just a tiny puppy) Sophie let out one very loud blood-curdling Eckie call. That was all it took to show the dog who's boss!

I often play ball with the dog, while the parrot is on my shoulder (this way I am not ignoring one or the other) and the dog loves retrieving the ball and I actually think my Sophie enjoys watching the action/movement etc. I can watch tv with the dog on my lap and the bird on my shoulder and each animal completely ignores the other.

When I leave the room, I do put Sophie in her cage.

A cute story: the bird has her own bedroom with a 2nd cage (other than the cage in the living room). This is because she used to be a chronic egg layer. Now she goes to bed at 8PM (she asks us and gives us hints that she WANTS to go to bed by 8PM) and we cover her cage until about 8 AM.

Every morning when I go in the room to get the bird I say to the dog, "let's go get the birdie!". He just looks at me like I am nuts and doesn't bother going into the bird's room. But the other day, he followed my wife into the bird's room and "helped" her uncover the bird's cage by grabbing one corner of the cage cover and pulling it back.

The dog chose my wife as his favorite and I am Sophie's all-time fav, so I guess it all worked out in the end (although I wish I was the dog's fav too)

Thanks again for the support and advice!

JFish (Joel)
 
Top