Parrot and People Parents.

For those of you who had parrots before having children, how did you adjust to having both? How did the birds adjust? I'm clearly not having children in the immediate future, but I see so many ads for rehomed parrots due to having children that I'm wondering how people make it work.

Having kids is overwhelming, and I can understand why some people can't make it work. Birds are loud and sleeping babies are a precious, dear thing. Some kids no matter how "used" to it they should be just can't sleep with the normal household sounds. I never went out of my way to keep things quiet for my boys but my youngest is like me and is a very light sleeper. Thankfully, our birds don't bother them.

Neglected birds behave "badly" and with the intense circumstances around kids sometimes something has to give, and often it is the bird. I don't give parents a hard time for rehoming in favor of kids because kids come first, even if they weren't first. Allergies, personality conflicts etc.



I respect people rehoming for sane reasons. Even if it isn't something I could see myself doing, I don't mind people trying to offer their bird a better life.

Sorry, I went off on a rant there LOL.


I had parrots when I had my youngest, and nothing changed. If my male cockatiel got too loud during a much needed nap I covered the cage and/or gave snacks to keep him busy. I don't know about bigger, more demanding parrots.

Julsiebean wrote:

Having kids is overwhelming, and I can understand why some people can't make it work. Birds are loud and sleeping babies are a precious, dear thing. Some kids no matter how "used" to it they should be just can't sleep with the normal household sounds. I never went out of my way to keep things quiet for my boys but my youngest is like me and is a very light sleeper. Thankfully, our birds don't bother them.

Neglected birds behave "badly" and with the intense circumstances around kids sometimes something has to give, and often it is the bird. I don't give parents a hard time for rehoming in favor of kids because kids come first, even if they weren't first. Allergies, personality conflicts etc.

I respect people rehoming for sane reasons. Even if it isn't something I could see myself doing, I don't mind people trying to offer their bird a better life.

Sorry, I went off on a rant there LOL.

I had parrots when I had my youngest, and nothing changed. If my male cockatiel got too loud during a much needed nap I covered the cage and/or gave snacks to keep him busy. I don't know about bigger, more demanding parrots.

I agree with Julsie. But I also think people don't really try that hard to make things work.

I had a jenday, CAG, goffin, M2, 2 pet tiels, a couple of pairs of breeding tiels, and a shep X dog when I had EC. It worked out fine for me. My birds didn't scream all the time or for attention and the dog was obedience trained. The dog did get into the diaper pail and ripped up dirty diapers once all over the room. That was a mess. There was no jealousy from the birds. The birds got to look at the new baby like it was a new pet to the household.

When EC was a toddler I took in a U2 for a while. The U2 had not been taught boundaries and would race off its cage when EC was having snacks and try to mug her. I'd block him with my body and send him back to his cage. He learned he wasn't allowed to mug people. He also learned if he couldn't behave he'd get locked back in his cage with no new toy or whatever EC was eating. He learned if he behaved we'd share our food and toys with him, just the human gets it first.

Having a child made no difference to me. As for allergies. I'm allergic to everything. I had an allergist get exasperated with me and told me there was nothing he could do for me if I insisted on having all the animals. I said - ok, I can live with that. I'm also NOT asthmatic. I could understand getting rid of an animal if I couldn't breathe and turned blue. I just have chronic stuffiness. I'm a sudafed fiend.