Feather toy for zebra pluckers

[Babs _Owner]

I was just doing some random surfing and came across these brilliant toys for our innocent ....cough-cough...sweet plucking zebras.

The feathers in one of the designs seems brilliant to attract pluckers.

If anyone uses this and it works, let us know.

https://bonkabirdtoys.com/bird-toys/med ... y-plucker/

https://bonkabirdtoys.com/bird-toys/sma ... y-plucker/

[Babs _Owner]

This design seems intriguing too

http://www.animalworldnetwork.com/b1950 ... 81950.html

[sparrowsong98]

Hmmm... is this for self plucking or stopping cagemates from plucking each other?

[Babs _Owner]

sparrowsong98

I think it's for both. They don't look overly expensive, which is nice.

[lovezebs]

Babs

I know my Linnies would love the Polly Plucker further down on the same site.

As to the 3rd option you mentioned, I have tried it, and no one showed much interest in it really, so it was a disappontment.

Regarding the toys with the coloured feathers, I always worry about the dye which they use to colour the feathers with.

My Linnies and Budgies, love shredding these things:
https://goo.gl/images/NdtMns

I like this idea, and have to try it.... been saving my bathroom tissue cardboard rolls for it, lol.....

https://goo.gl/images/PrFPvS

And this looks like fun too...

https://goo.gl/images/MxL94y

[Babs _Owner]

lovezebs

I was hoping the dye was food coloring. Ugh. It's as if the plucker likes the pulling and slight tug of the pluck, almost more than getting the feather itself. The little feather duster seems cool for that, as they would have to tug on it a bit.

Hmmm. Wonder if they make one all-natural.


I've done the toilet paper roll with tommy hay (societies emptied it pretty fast).......but the plastic bottle is FANTASTIC! It would take forever for them to get through all the hay. You have to try that one and send pictures!

[Stuart whiting]

I was just doing some random surfing and came across these brilliant toys for our innocent ....cough-cough...sweet plucking zebras.

The feathers in one of the designs seems brilliant to attract pluckers.

If anyone uses this and it works, let us know.

https://bonkabirdtoys.com/bird-toys/med ... y-plucker/

https://bonkabirdtoys.com/bird-toys/sma ... y-plucker/

My god Babs I've seen it all now , plucking toys for zebras, what ever next,

If my friends walked into me birdroom and see all those hanging up in me cages I'd seriously be ribbed chronicly with laughter

To many of us that is just another gimmick to make yer spend yer money on more rubish

[Babs _Owner]

Stuart whiting

What we really need for zebras are these...

[Stuart whiting]

Babs

Yea yer most probably right Babs

[Sheather]

If my friends walked into me birdroom and see all those hanging up in me cages I'd seriously be ribbed chronicly with laughter

That's unfortunate, because birds should have toys like that available in their enclosures. People seem to think finches don't need anything to play with, just because they don't usually self-harm without enrichment like parrots do. It doesn't mean it's suitable to keep them with nothing in their enclosure to do.

I am a strong supporter for enrichment for all animals, and finches no less than any other bird. I provide mine with a variety of preening toys, swings, varied sorts of perches and I change everything up regularly. It is scientifically proven that animals of all kinds raised in enriching environments are more intelligent and adjusted than those kept in impoverished surroundings, like barren box cages that some breeders use, where there's nothing but a pair of dowel perches for the poor birds to jump back and forth on.

These toys are way too expensive for what they are though. I make my own with clumps of jute twin, cut into short lengths and knotted together. You can add feathers or little bells to it, and each toy costs a few cents. My birds love them. My canaries are also really into playing with the various little shiny toys that move sold for parakeets, so I do splurge and keep a few of those around to rotate in their cages at all times.

[lovezebs]

Sheather

I agree.

I have started looking into sites with different ideas of diy toys for birds. There are such wonderful ideas out there, with very inexpensive supplies at the dollar store. So so much cheaper than buying toys .

[Stuart whiting]

If my friends walked into me birdroom and see all those hanging up in me cages I'd seriously be ribbed chronicly with laughter

That's unfortunate, because birds should have toys like that available in their enclosures. People seem to think finches don't need anything to play with, just because they don't usually self-harm without enrichment like parrots do. It doesn't mean it's suitable to keep them with nothing in their enclosure to do.

I am a strong supporter for enrichment for all animals, and finches no less than any other bird. I provide mine with a variety of preening toys, swings, varied sorts of perches and I change everything up regularly. It is scientifically proven that animals of all kinds raised in enriching environments are more intelligent and adjusted than those kept in impoverished surroundings, like barren box cages that some breeders use, where there's nothing but a pair of dowel perches for the poor birds to jump back and forth on.

These toys are way too expensive for what they are though. I make my own with clumps of jute twin, cut into short lengths and knotted together. You can add feathers or little bells to it, and each toy costs a few cents. My birds love them. My canaries are also really into playing with the various little shiny toys that move sold for parakeets, so I do splurge and keep a few of those around to rotate in their cages at all times.

Dylan the difference is that I'm a specialist breeder and exhibitor of finches, I much prefer to keep and breed me birds to as much as a natural surrounding as possible, ok so basically all of me cages would just have a serious of perches in but me cages would be large as finches as small as they may be all need plenty of excercise, me avaires would all be bushed out with foliage as to make it as natural as possible, this would be used for privacy, weather protection and aswell as for breeding in.

After all would finches out in a wild state have toys to play with, I very much doubt it, any serious breeder of " FINCHES " would not use such rubish because we all know that this junk is simply not needed

[Sheather]

Sorry, it is. I would hope that if you are so such a specialist breeder you would provide your birds with a high level of care, but your apparent dislike of enrichment reflects poorly upon you. Birds need something to keep themselves entertained with, and in a cage setting "rubbish" little toys like this are very beneficial. In the wild, these birds spend lots of time manipulating the environment with their beaks - finding and opening seeds which are still on the plants, and not just in a dish, poking around to find insects, selecting grasses and weaving nests, things most cage birds have very limited opportunity to do.

If someone has a planted aviary, no, it would be pointless to fill it with hanging trinkets because the leaves, twigs, grasses etc are then going to function as the enrichment for the bird to poke around in. All of my birds' most enjoyed "toys" indeed are wild branches brought inside in the summer, especially willow, which they play in for hours until they've stripped all the leaves. But a cage should have a few toys, which are changed out regularly. Birds kept singly have an even greater need for something to preen as it can reduce loneliness if only a little.

I have noticed over the years a dramatic difference in the temperament and intelligence between store-bought cage-bred finches, presumably raised in very impoverished surroundings, and those raised being allowed to fly around the house, forage, and play with a variety of toys (in other words, in an enriched environment.) The latter birds are much better problem solvers - they figure out new feeders or waterers instantly while the pet shop birds can take days, and they immediately figure out how to get in and out of a small cage door while the others take a good few weeks to thoroughly learn and will still bumble into the side of the cage without a door occasionally trying to get in or out. The pet store birds are always bumbling and slow in comparison to those which grow up in more dynamic environments with a lot to do. Not everyone can let their birds out but I do feel it is a disservice to the birds to raise them in environments like the typical breeding cages with nothing to do but sit on some sticks. Even a large aviary is only marginally better if there is nothing to do in it.

[lovezebs]

Stuart whiting

Have to disagree with you.

In the wild, birds when not sleeping, spend all of their time flying, foraging for food, hunting for bugs, looking for water, searching and competing for mates, looking for nesting sites, hunting for nesting materials, building nests, raising their young, chasing off invaders, evading dangers, etc.

In captivity, (as breeder birds), they are offered a small box to live in, food (not of their choice) and water in dishes, 2 or 3 dowels to hop back and forth on, a ready made nest box, a mate (not of their choosing), with producing young the only purpose of their existance.

Like Sheather (Dylan), I've found that captive birds do better in interesting environments. They are more alert, more active, more curious and engaged, more adventurous and more intelligent, and raise their chicks to be the same.

An environment that offers said "rubbish", is entertaining for them, and offers them something to do with their days, making a captive existance more fun, more diverting, and more bearable.

Most of us can't offer them huge outdoor planted aviaries, which would more closely mimic a natural setting, but we can at least make their captive lives a little more interesting.

This article was written primarily for Parrots, but I think it applies to all captive birds :

http://www.avianenrichment.com/diy-enrichment

[Stuart whiting]

Sheather

Well I'm sorry Dylan but were completely in different leagues to you here, many of us don't just keep a few finches in ornamental cages in doors in the house and let em flying around and playing, serious breeders birds are all in birdsrooms and avaires where we take our breeding and exhibiting very seriously indeed and to the highest of stds,

Yea yer right about the birds finding much to do in a planted avairy because of all of the natural foliage,

You say that birds need something to do in a cage, so when I take me time to go out to get dustbin bags full of a various natural wild green foods this is not a stimulant for my birds then, which I could give every other day if need be,

My birds in the cages would have a field day in clambering all over the different wild weeds that I place on the floors of me cages

But the big difference here is that this is all natural to the birds and at the same time conditioning me birds,

Finches unfortunately don't condition themselves by playing with wooden and plastic toys

There is however a gap in the market for bird toys as regards to parrots and parakeets because these birds being bigger, more inquisitive by nature aswell as the intelligence I can go along with this but toys for finches I really can't see the sence in it,

Throughout the whole of me birdkeeping life I've obviously know an awful lot of specialist breeders in England, Ireland, Belgium, Italy, Germany, Holland and Australia and can honestly say that I personally don't know of 1 person who uses toys for finches, not any serious breeder anyway