Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hi everyone i know every parrot is consered high maintaince but i'm reading up on both the eclectus parrot and the african grey. I live in australia the eclectus parrot goes for $800 australian dollars and the african grey goes for around $4,000 to $6,000 australian dollars. I'm wandering which of these species is higher to maintain eg feed,vet,toys and other expenses. Right now i own 1 h/r male sun conure, 1 h/r female sun conure which i'm planing on breeding, 1 h/r male gcc, 1 h/r female gcc which i plan to breed, 1 h/r cockatiel and 1 h/r rainbow lorikeet. These are all my pets some are pets plus for breeding. I have time to spend for 1 more bird and i either want an eclectus parrot or an african grey. My birds get fruit and veggies everyday to every second day, They have seed in there cages all day and also get pellets. They also eat mealworms as a treat. My guys get let out of there cages for 4 to 5 hours sometimes more, They get plenty of human interaction within this time. I want to get a bigger bird i love intelligent birds which is why i'm looking into the eclectus parrot and african grey. I know both species are known to pluck when bored so i will change there toys around every week or 2, They also need alot of human interaction which i can do, My boyfriend and I do go travling once every 6 months but plan on taking the grey or eclectus with us. My mum said she will look after the rest of my birds while we are gone. I want to make sure that i give the right home and enviroment to the bird, How much the perrot costs doesn't matter to me. I just want to make sure i do right towards the bird and myself. I'm looking to get one of these in the next 5 or more years, I want to do plenty of research before deciding which one, I also have to save up the money too. So any advice would be greatful, Thanks in advance.

I would say each bird has both its pros and cons. Let's start with the african grey. The african grey happens to be one of my top two favorite types of birds. The require tons of interaction and can become bored quite easily. Like all birds there is a chance they may not talk but any I have ever had contact with has talked up a storm. They are in general a quieter bird meaning they usually do not scream as some other species do. They may make all types of noises which some people can find annoying. Ours seem to love all types of whistles, bells, beeps etc and mimic them constantly. They like to do a truck backing beep which is kind of cute unless they start doing it at 5:00 am which is when our trash truck comes which they learned the noise from. Usually once they start learning sounds and words they will pick different times during the day to run through their whole vocabulary of both words and noises. I happen to find this funny but some people find it annoying.

As far as an african greys diet I have always had great luck getting them to try new things even though both were on a strictly seed diet when they arrived. You do need to make sure they have a wide variety of healthy foods. They seem to have a tendency towards low calcium and if I remember correctly they sometimes get too much iron in their diet which can also be a health problem so the diet does need to be watched. Poor nutrition is another reason they sometimes start plucking.

In my experience the african grey does seem to be more of a one person or one "couple" bird. They usually do not like change and sometimes are even scared of their new toys so they need to be introduced to them slowly and with care. I am not sure how they would do with traveling as this would be a big change and change seems to be scary to them. Maybe someone else has experience with the traveling aspect.

Okay the eclectus. The eclectus male is usually considered more of a family bird. The female can be a family bird as well but does seem much more tempermental (again only my opinion). They don't seem to be scared of toys or new things as much but also may not seem to like toys. This does not mean they shouldn't be offered or that they won't learn to play with them but many seem to have favorites and ignore all others. They have a potential for a huge vocabulary. Our female VOS can say almost anything. Anytime someone knocks on the door she says, "somebody's at the door, get the door, it's locked, nobody's home go away!" She manages to say this in basically my voice so I have had several people think I was at home and joking when I actually wasn't there, LOL! She can be quite tempermental and will one minute act sweet and cuddly then next she will bite HARD!! I think though that this has more to do with her past homes then the species on a whole.

Diet for eclectus. Be careful on mainly pellet or even mainly seed diets. An all pellet diet seems to cause toe tapping if I recall this was from too much vitamin A, but then others get not enough. They seem to do better on minimal pellets, some seeds and mainly fresh foods, veggies, pasta, grains, fruits etc. I have not had any really picky eaters and they do like the african greys seem to be more willing to try a large variety of foods.

Hope I didn't ramble on too much and helped! Feel free to ask more.

Hi
I have an eclectus parrot, they're very high maintenance, no problem at all if you really want to put in the hard yards. When in AU are you? AG are illegal some states, I know they defintitely are illegal in WA but not sure about the other states.

From everything I have read they're both pretty equal in maintenance, feeding etc...& they both need A LOT!

Unsure about the greys but ekkies aren't recommended to have pellets in their diet. They have a longer digestive tract than other parrots & require at least 80% natural foods, 20% anything else. I have heard AG aren't much different in the food requirements but you might need to do more research on that one.

Also both do really well if you buy toddler interactive toys for them & a HUGE toy box for them to rumage around in. I take my ekkie travelling with me. I found it was a worth while cause because they're very shy by nature, having him travel with us meant he was socialized well & he's far from being a shy boy now!

Good luck in deciding.