Newspaper in the water bowl...

[Merv]

Hi, I have two eclectus parrots, male and female.
The female has not been here for long (2 weeks or so)
I've seen my male do some strange things in his life that i dont understand why he would do that but i gues he's just a little 'special' in his head regarding those things.
One of the weird things he does is shredding newspaper, turning the pieces in to little balls and puts them in the water bowl, when the water bowl is filled up he gets them out and transfers them to his food bowl.
Its facinating to watch really.
But today i discovered that the female is doing the exact same thing now!
Why?
What is this behavior? is it normal? i've never seen parrots do this with such precision and dedication.

 

[TikiMyn]

I have heard of more large parrots doing that, I think they like it? It sure is fasinating! One of my lovebirds likes to throw stuff in their water bowl too sometimes

 

[Aggie]

Very interesting as my boy will wash his toys in his water bowl and then transfers to his food dish. He also drags cups up to fill with water and then transfer the water to his seed dish. He has no newspaper available to him so intrigued if he did would he do the same as your birds

I think maybe the girl is just copying your boy? But in sayung that they do like to roll stuff up. My boy does it with his underfluff if it comes out and then flicks it. I also think these guys have so much free time compared to their wild relatives they create projects for themselves