Morning Routines with Your Parrot

[kendrafitz]

I was wondering what everyone's morning routine is.

Ours is my stumbling downstairs around 7 and heading right for coffee. ☺ While the coffee is brewing, I go to Rosie's tree, get her new food and a new dish of water. I then open the blinds in the family room. All the while Rosie keeps a close eye on me from her perch in her cage in the dining room. Once her tree is ready, I go to the dining room, open the queen's cage and have her climb on my hand and then shoulder. I never open the blinds in the dining room/living room before I get her. If I do she will charge to the top of her cage, yelling, flapping and dodging gleefully once I open her cage. She refuses to come down and I just don't have it in me to fight her so early. Anyway, once she is on my shoulder we walk to her tree. We have the same conversation every morning. Good Morning Rosie, Did you have a good sleep? Did you have good baby birdie dreams? She answers the questions with head nods, kisses and happy squeals. She also says what sounds like a garbled Want more. Which I always assumed was her making sure I got her tree ready. I then tell her yes, you have breakfast and new water. To which, she either repeats her garbled phrase or looks at me like I am a dummy and climbs onto her tree. This morning it occurred to me she was trying to say good morning and not want more. When I asked did you say good morning? She started pinning, bobbing and kissing me. So dumb Mommy has had it wrong all this time. Rosie is saying good morning back. :) She then goes potty, eats and dunks her food while we get the kids ready for school and I have my coffee. She will hang out on her tree until it is time for us to preen before we shower.

What does your morning look like?

[spiritbird]

Birdies stay under covers until mom has coffee brewing. Then gently remove covers and say good morning. Then drink coffee. After that let birdies out to exercise and then comes birdie breakfast. All is well.

[Cedardave]

With us, we usually feed our babies if they are ready,then do the rounds starting with the macaws and working our way thru the house.If my wife gets to sleep in I leave the bedroom birds to last.The livingroom gang gets uncovered as we feed and water each one.They all respond to good morning with the same good morning.Our one grey says hello evertime she sees one of us.Once everyone is fed and watered(about 2 hours) its playtime.Each gets time to play and socialize.Those on eggs stay in the cage and we just talk to them.Then its off to play with the babies in the nursery.By the time all this is done its coffee time for a while before we have an hours break...then its afternoon snack time...veggies or fruit...we alternate so they dont get bored.Evening is remove and wash all the food dishes except those on eggs as they eat all day and night.We cover those in the livingroom,feed the babies again and fall into bed.I work 3days on and3 off..so my off is the routine above.My wife often helps but this is her full time job/passion.

[Casper's 2nd best friend]

Come down stairs, open curtains and generally make a noise so that Casper is awake and not surprised when we take his fleecy cage-cover off. Open top of cage and front door so he can choose where to go and do his morning poop. Then remove his bowls and take them to the kitchen to prepare his breakfast. Cavalry training here: always feed and water your horse before yourself. When he has got his food we can then have our breakfast and Casper likes a bit as well, either a spoonful of oatmeal or a corner torn off our toast and marmalade. If we have meusli I pick out a nut for him.
Put CD player on so he can shriek along to Shania or one of his other discs. He gets excited when the post arrives and we are trying to get him to say "Hello Suzie" to our usual postie. Then Margaret cleans his cage and hoovers up the mess while I take him out of the way because he always wants to 'help'.
This happens every day except Friday which is weigh-day. After his poop and before his breakfast he gets bribed with half an almond to stay on the scales so we can check his weight which is recorded in the blue notebook which is a sort of diary record all things like vet visits and moulting periods so we can look back and compare.

[StitchynMe]

6:00 am- open all the curtains in the bedroom and let the morning sun in. Uncover Stitchy from his travel cage on the bed and transfer him to his big cage. Fill his food cup with pellets and give him fresh water.

I then go out to the kitchen and decide what fruit and vegetables to give him for the day, chop it up and put it on a pie plate, bring it in the bedroom and put it in his big cage.

Me- caffeine up, take a shower. Clean the house, attend to household chores.

Around 10: 00 am or so, let Stitchy out to climb around and cuddle. He likes to climb up the curtains and sit on top of the curtain rods, I think he likes to pretend he's in a jungle because he starts screaming and calling happily. When he comes down from his playtime. He goes back in his travel cage beside me, eats millet and munches on veggies and fruit. He then takes a nap before another play session ensues.

At night we have our cuddle time and scritches before bed, sleeps in travel cage beside me.

[Mare]

Tim and I are normally awake by 6:45, our room is downstairs from the bird's room. Tim jumps in the shower, I come up, put the tea on then open up the birds. I ALWAYS, whether feeling like it or not, walk into their room with a smile and happy hello :). Ask how their night was, open the drapes, get out their bowls for breakfast feedings and Chip is normally the most happy to see me. He will fly to my shoulder and chew on my glasses for a moment. When Tim comes upstairs, he gets Sassy out while he drinks his tea and Amigo is normally ready to get outside by this time. I take him out, we sit on the deck, doing cuddle bug, for awhile..then off he goes!

[Lady]

Our routine changes with my days of working and days off.
When I have to work the day starts extra early. I get up between 4:30 and 5:00 a.m. I usually take care of most of my needs after I heat my coffee. I take Lady's cover off her cage at around 6 a.m. once the curtains and blinds are open to let in the sun when it comes up. I usually have her food dish out the night before so I prepare her nuts and dried fruits for her first meal. Sometimes she gets some extra goodies like raw veggies and or bread in a separate bowl. I also wrap up in coffee filters or cupcake papers the shell nuts so she can forage for them.
Yes the morning greeting is often, "good morning my love, did you sleep well?" Most mornings she makes little noises to let me know she is awake before I remove the cover. She goes to the floor of the cage from the top perch where she sleeps. Time to get some fresh water, be right back. As I put her food in the cage I always tell her here is you breakfast when your ready and don't forget to drink your water. Once she has her fresh water I open the front of the cage to pet her a bit on her beak and head, then spend a few minutes talking with her. She doesn't go to eat while I'm there, and I imagine it is because it is to early.

I will add the day off routine as soon as I get another cup of coffee~

[PlaxMacaws]

I just wake up and dive into it! I'd better spare you an attempt on my part at listing the steps that I take and when they occur, though. And that's simply because each day can be vastly different in terms of my schedule. So the best description is that I typically squeeze maintenance tasks and attention sessions for my guys into each day's varying schedule. Hey, I never claimed to be the most efficient parrot care provider ;). But somehow it all seems to work out :)