RAINBOW THE HAWKHEAD PARROT
by Don Bradshaw don.bradshaw@cox.net

Don's note from the Hawkhead Discusslon List

Hello,

My bird Rainbow has generally mellowed in the last few years.  My wife retired and spends lots of time at home so that is part of the explanation for the change.  The other part is just learning on our part.  Rainbow will be 12 years old in February 2006. We have had her since she was 4.5 months old.  included below is an article I wrote when she was about 3 years old.  It was published in the Pet Bird Report, now the Companion Parrot Quarterly.  I was talking to Omar of Omar’s Exotic Birds a few months ago and he commented that he had not seen a more beautiful looking Hawkhead.   He was impressed with the way she had come out.  Her feathers are always beautiful.  The baths and blow dry’s have a lot to do with that.  She has never consistently been feather destructive, although she has bitten (not pulled) her feathers a couple of times when she was experiencing pain.  By the way, Omar was the one who told me how to train her to accept being tossed up and down while lying on her back in my hand.
Rainbow can be very jealous and protective but we see less and less of that.   Sometimes other people can even handle her.  Her wonderful and affectionate personality has been constant her entire life.  Most evenings she finds a spot underneath my shirt to snuggle for an hour or two.
I think there is a percentage of the population of novice bird owners who would do well with a Hawkhead as the first parrot, but that is not everyone.  That is why I think people sometimes say Hawkheads are best for experienced parrot owners.  If you are the right personality willing and realistically able to make the long term commitment to consistent and life long care, and if you are one who continues to learn, you can probably do as well as anyone.
Anyway, I will let my article speak for itself.

Don and Rainbow the 12 year old female Hawkhead

Don's Article

There is painfully little written about the Hawkheaded parrot. This is a shame because this bird has better pet potential that many other parrots in my opinion. If properly socialized when young it has the playfulness, loyalty, affection, and energy that many people get dogs, cats and other larger animals for. The Hawkhead is about 220 grams, smaller than an Eclectus but large in comparison to a cockatiel. It is strikingly beautiful, but a description won’t do it justice; you should try to meet a good specimen in person. Suffice it to say we weren't exaggerating much when we named ours Rainbow.

Rainbow is three years old now.  We acquired her at a good local bird store as a self reward for a profitable career change.  We went to the store only half thinking we might buy a bird.  We really were only going to look.  We had thought enough about it to conclude that the species would not matter if the personality were right.  We had already decided that most exotic birds cost too much money.  This little Hawkhead changed our whole attitude about price.  My mother, who accompanied my wife Ester and me on this outing, concluded she should leave us alone (once we found Rainbow) since we were obviously in the middle of a bonding process and didn't need her help.

In previous trips we had seen many birds who tolerated us fairly well.   Some even demonstrated their affection toward us to varying degrees.  Rainbow, though, would rather cuddle and play than eat.  She (we had her DNA sexed later) was so comfortable around any human that in the pet store when she was preening her back feathers and someone would come up and start to scratch her neck and head feathers, she wouldn't even look up to see who was doing it!  Her early socialization was enhanced after an accident she suffered while just a few months old.  She somehow fell and broke her beak.  This high transverse break (not lengthwise) resulted in one of the pet shop employees undertaking to care for her night and day to ensure her recovery after the Veterinarian had cauterized the bleeding beak.  This dedicated employee took the bird with her everywhere she went.  This helped strengthen the bird to human bond.   Our bird can be taken to the bird store and put right next to another bird of the same species and show only mild interest, even though the other Hawkhead shows lots of interest in her.  I should add that her beak healed reasonably well but remains very soft compared to other parrots.

All of this may lead one to believe that our bird differs due to exceptional early socialization.  Yet the other Hawkheads we have played with at the bird store seem to have similar personalities.  It is either a species characteristic or an exceptional local breeder.

Once a decision was made to purchase this parrot (an intimidating thought at the time since we had never owned anything larger than a cockatiel before) we put a deposit down and proceeded to make ready our home.  Luckily the salesperson recommended we purchase a book called The Guide to the Well Behaved Parrot.   Actually we bought one copy for each person in the house (three copies).  We also bought a huge macaw cage and furnished it appropriately.  When we finally brought her home, all was prepared, including the humans.  We had spent much time at the pet store learning about how to care for this four and a half month old bird.   This included multiple training sessions for both Ester and me in the art of syringe feeding.  Rainbow was slower than I suspect is normal for most birds in learning certain eating skills; undoubtedly this was due to her beak injury.  She didn't finish weaning entirely until she was well over a year old.  In fact she still eats a bit of liquid food mix each afternoon, although not from a syringe.  She licks it from a small dish like a cat drinking milk.  It is about the consistency of cake batter and we use a formula designed for adult birds.  It ensures she gets certain nutrients and represents another valuable eating skill.

Rainbow is smart.  She was successfully potty trained in one day.   She knows not to poop when someone is holding her unless we are outdoors, in which case it’s okay.  She generally will feel free to go if placed on a stationary perch of almost any kind, but never on the couch.  This is not the only thing she has learned in one lesson, although not all lessons are intentional.  Rainbow has never been allowed onto my shoulder.  Once and only once I allowed her to perch on my shoulder for a moment while I was doing something requiring both hands.  Before this "lesson" she wouldn't even try to get to my shoulder.  After breaking the rule once, though, it took me several months to retrain her.  Now she feels free to walk anywhere on my arm, but she won’t cross the imaginary line to my shoulder.

Intelligence takes many forms.  A previous PBR article mentioned a Cockatoo that feigned a broken wing to garner more attention after having experienced a real broken wing some years before.  Well, as you might imagine, Rainbow’s variation on that theme involved her beak.  About once every week or two she would develop a case of lockjaw.  The condition would seem to coincide with a lack of attention, a rare situation in Rainbow’s existence.  The Veterinarian could find no cause.  It sometimes took hours to coax her beak open by putting something tempting next to the side of her beak where she would attempt to get at it with her tongue.  The beak would open slowly and by degrees.  We will never know for sure if it was a behavior learned when she was receiving so much attention after her beak injury, but it’s interesting that it never occurred again after I came back from a week long fishing trip.  That was seven months ago.

Rainbow is protective.  She will eventually accept someone who is present in our household for many weeks, but she won’t allow a stranger to hold her (with some rare exceptions).  She also teaches us the origin of the concept of "pecking order."  When I am not around, the bird will love our daughter Tina to death.  When I step into the room, Tina faces instant rejection.  Ester is treated as almost my equal, but there is a mild though unmistakable preference for me.   What little I have read about Hawkheads stresses their protective nature.  It is written that when breeding them it is necessary to have a method for examining the young while denying access to the parents, since they will want to vigorously defend the babies.  A recent article in PBR mentioned their tendency to defend their human flock to the death if necessary.

Rainbow has a joy of living and loving.  If you are holding her and your attention wanders, she may force her head under your hand to remind you to pet her head.  When on the couch with us she frequently initiates a chase the hand game where she hops around like a dancing buzzard in pursuit of a moving hand.  When she decides it’s time to "lose" she will roll onto her back and fight with her feet.  This means it’s time to transform play time into cuddle time. Neck scratching results in an instant mood change.  She will lie down flat, close her eyes, start scratching the feathers around her ear or the top of her head with her claw, and raise her red and blue neck feathers as only a Hawkhead can do.  The look of contentment she projects at that time cannot be described in words.

Rainbow is gentle and very trusting.  She never bites unless she is scared. I believe her comfort level with her human "flock" is high even by parrot standards.  For example, she will allow me to place her on her back in the palm of my hand and toss her up and down a short distance.  She tolerates this completely without struggle or apparent fear.  This seems completely opposite from a bird’s normal instinctive behavior.  This utter acceptance and trust makes for a level of rapport that enhances our daily lives.  As I said earlier, I think this is partly attributable to the species.  Hawkheaded parrots are difficult to breed, but as more is learned about their requirements there may be more of them available and the price should come down.  As it is now, they are relatively rare and more expensive than the average parrot. In my opinion they are priceless.

One caution. If you aren't inclined to make the effort to include your bird in your life in as many ways as possible, think twice before getting a Hawkhead.   My wife and I both work during the day but because of staggered work hours the bird spends less than eight hours alone.  She is part of both our morning routines and then she comes out of the cage as soon as we are home in the evening.  Any time we are home she is out of the cage.  She loves being out of the cage.  Since she is our only pet we dote on her far too much, although always within a firm set of rules.   Hawkheads need attention, even if this is just sitting on a perch observing their humans at relatively close range perform everyday tasks.  Their intensely emotional makeup enables them to bond like superglue but it can sometimes be their undoing.  I have heard of Hawkheads going one step beyond feather picking.   Sometimes they pick their skin.  Happily ours has never been self destructive but, based on my experience with their personality traits,  I would venture two guesses as to why a Hawkhead would do this.  The first would be lack of attention.   What may be adequate attention for some birds may very well be emotional starvation for a Hawkhead.  The second is lack of rules. We have worked hard to establish the bird’s place on the pecking order.  Consequently, she seldom initiates aggressive behavior on her own.  We are much more the initiators than she and she looks to us for guidance.  She is in the comfortable position of not having to make the important decisions in life.  All she has to do is follow a few simple rules and she gets more attention than any creature deserves.

Some additional bits of information about Hawkheads based on our experiences.  They aren't good talkers, but they imitate sounds well, like the buttons on our cordless telephone, the creaking of the back door, and kissing sounds.   Apparently berries are an important part of their natural diet, which would explain why she likes the sweet flavor of the seven types of guava fruit we grow around the house.   Her VFF (very favorite food) is French toast.  It is the only food she refuses to waste; she eats every bit.