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FAQ About the Hiking Cockatoos

Chapter 5 The Beak and Other Details

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The Beak: Chewing

Cockatoos are also known as "chewers." They will chew any piece of wood, plastic, cloth, paper, cardboard, etc., that they can reach with their beak. They want to know about the world around them, and their beak is their tool for that exploration. Cockatoo beaks are constantly growing, they require constant use to keep in trim. Most Cockatoos seem to have a personal dedication to the laws of entropy and try to disassemble the universe around them.

Our birds use their beaks to shred wooden toys into small toothpick fragments. Whether the wood is hard maple or soft eucalyptus, they will find an imperfection or soft spot and then exploit it until the object is in ruins. What's the big deal about this? Well, it means that a Cockatoo will inevitably destroy any wood or paper products that it can reach with its beak. To you a piece of wood may be your grandmother's heirloom chair, to a Cockatoo its a chew toy. A pile of paper may be a valued photo album, to a Cockatoo its another chew toy. If you own a Cockatoo, these incidents will happen. Your most valued furniture, papers and clothing will be damaged or ruined. When it happens you will have to keep your temper in check and salvage the debris. The bird will never understand why you became upset. And danger lurks with your carelessness, as lamp cords and extension cords are extremely vulnerable to a Cockatoo beak, but such things could be the last thing that a Cockatoo chews. Thus constant supervision is required when a Cockatoo is out of its cage.

After eating, they often seem driven to find paper or cardboard to rip off, roll into a small wad, and then push it around the interior of their beaks, as if they were "flossing." It does appear to be a hygiene action designed to clean up food residue.


Mozart sitting on his kitchen perch stand

And when it comes to chewing, if Cockatoos can not reach it, they can climb almost anything to get to it. I've watched Mozart climb smooth brass pole lamps. He just grips the smooth metal with his powerful paws and up he goes, appearing to defy gravity. Those paws (two toes forward, two backward) are tipped with razor pointed black nails, similar to the nails of a medium size dog. But it is not the nails that allow him to defy gravity, it is the strong grip of his toes.


The nails on his claws require constant care. Twice a week he has a "pedicure". Mozart will calmly hold out his paw for us to trim, a small emery board is used to remove the sharp tip of the nails. He squeaks and squirms during this, and will not allow us to remove too much. But without these frequent pedicures his claws would cut the skin on our hands and forearms. We learned this the hard way when we first brought him home. I remember that it was as if someone had taken a razor blade and cut short cuts on my arms. Amadeus is almost as docile as Mozart about beak and feather trims, but Kaipo is extremely distressed and we have to wrap him up in a towel for these trims.


Uh, What about the "Droppings"?

I'm often asked if the birds are messy, and if the "droppings" smell. Cockatoos drink a lot of water and excrete it on a regular basis. They can be potty-trained. But like all birds, their anatomy does not permit much storage. Like a small child, you must anticipate their excretory events and provide them with the proper disposal point. Mozart is partially potty trained. He often tries very hard to make sure he does his business in the right place, usually on some newspaper we have in a particular place. But I have to keep an eye on him and make sure he is given the opportunity to do it in the right place. His droppings do not smell. If they did, we would know that he was sick, since the droppings are never smelly. After a drink of water his droppings are large and mostly watery. They may be ejected a considerable distance.

Kaipo and Amadeus are being potty trained and will excrete on request (if they have something to do.) But they are not reliable yet. While I can hike for hours with them on my shoulder without an accidents, this self control is lost around large crowds of people. Fortunately, it all comes out in the wash.

If you want a Cockatoo companion this is something else you must be prepared to accept (and clean up.) We use newspaper in the bottom of his cage to collect the debris and droppings, replacing it at night before bedtime and again in the morning upon awakening.


All the birds are fairly messy with their food. After all food is food when you're hungry, but after you're full, food then becomes a toy to be flung around. They like to crush their food pellets (Roudybush maintenance diet) on the bars of their cage, so a lot of it falls out. They like to wipe off their beaks on the cage bars and perches after eating. Thus the cage must be cleaned on a regular basis to remove the food debris. The area around the cages requires a daily vacuuming to keep clean.


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