Last Updated on by Catherine Tobsing
The featured image above was submitted by a reader who happened to be passing a car with a male Eclectus parrot as a passenger.
The position of the Eclectus parrots feet, one on the horizontal bar of the swing and one foot on the vertical frame of the swing.
helps the parrot contend with inertia ~ see the video below for an explanation of “inertia”.
This is important because I see a lot of pet bird carriers with a single perch installed from side to side.
Thus when facing forward your bird’s only defense against inertia is to tighten their grip around the perch as their body gets forced forward and backward while the vehicle accelerates and decelerates.
Birds have few nerves in their feet so offsetting inertia is not as painful as it is stressful
Circling back to the featured image, the Eclectus is able to resist inertia by gripping the vertical frame of the swing with its foot.
A smooth dowel perch is rough on a bird’s feet because no challenges are presented.
The grooming perch in the clear carrier (above) will grind the bird’s feet bottoms as it rocks back and offset inertia motion.
Our preference is an upside-down Booda soft rope perch appropriately sized for the traveling bird.
Written by Mitch Rezman
Approved by Catherine Tobsing
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