Abstract
On September 17, 1990, we received
four pairs of Celebes Hanging Parrots
from our friend David Coenraad, then
owner of Three Star Enterprises of
Pico Rivera, California. On February 5,
1991, and on September 21, 1991, we
were ab le to acquire o ne more
Celebes hen and two more cocks from
David. All the birds we re very immature,
only showing the slightest hint of
red on the heads of the males.
These five pairs and the one extra
cock we re set up in a flight five feet
long, three feet deep by five feet high.
We left them in this flight to mature
and build up to top breeding shape.
The birds lived in this flight longer
than we had planned. We were building
a new avia1y and didn't want to set
them up to breed until they could be
moved into the new avia1y.
During th eir stay in the flight, we fed
them a di e t that Kathy and I had
devised according to everything we
found written on the genus Loriculus.
The flight was fed a d1y nectar that
consisted of sugars, vitamins, mine rals,
protein and amino acids. This was
fed in a ten ounce s ize stainless s teel
cup hung on the side of the flight. A
ten ounce size stainless steel cup was
filled with clean fresh tap water and
hung next to the one with the d1y necta
r. This allows the birds to get the ir
tongue wet and stick it in the dry nectar,
and it sticks to the tongue. In this
manner they can make nectar for
themselves. Always make liquid nectar
and have it available at all times
until they stan eating the d1y real well,
then start cutting back on the liquid
until you do n't need it any more.
We also fed them fresh fruit, vegetables
and pasta in a separate cup. One
of their favorite fruits is grapes, which
they will hold in one claw and eat the
inside until it's gone. They also love
corn on the cob or cut off.
Keep some spray millet in the cage
at all times. They seem to like eating it.
Celebes Hanging Parrots will usually
eat small mealworms and ant eggs if
you offer them. One thing that we
found, they must not be fed parakeet
seed. Instead, use finch and other soft
seeds. Never keep Hanging Parrots on
seed only diets. In the wild they eat
bugs, unripe seed in milk stage, fruits,
vegetables and flower buds both
closed and open.
In late August 1991, we started to
move all the birds into our new avia1y
and set them up to breed. The new
aviary has fluorescent full spectrum
model T-10 Vita-Lites. The Vita-Lites
are hooked to a lighting compute r.
The lighting computer turns on two fiftywatt
incandescent lights slowly to
simulate the rising sun. It then turns
on the fluorescent lights and turns off
the in candescent lights. At night the
lighting compute r reve rses the o pe ratio
n to simulate sunset. At the time the
Ce lebes Hanging Parrots went to nest,
the lights were on from 5:30 in the
morning until 10:30 at night.
The new aviary also has a s te reo
system that pl ays thunde rstorms , a
babbling brook, ocean waves and frog
tapes.The tapes add to the pleasantness
of the e nvironment in the building.
The re are a lso two b abbling
brook wate r fountains running all the
time to add mo re pleasant sounds and
fo r humid ity. We have la rge humidifie
rs running all the time to raise the
level of humidity in the breeding
building.
We decided to set the hanging parro
ts up in groups of three pairs to a
cage. The cages are six feet lo ng, 24
inches high and 24 inches wide. Each
cage has a feed cup ho lde r at each
end that accommodates three stainless
s teel ten ounce cups . These we fill
with dry necta r, pla in ta p water and
fruit with vegetable mi x . The finch
seed is in a sta inless steel cup set on
the floor in the middle of the cage to
keep s tray seed in. Pe rches a re
mo unted at each end of the cage for
breeding and courting.
Colllting is vety inte resting to watch.
The male will let his wings droop low
so that his red back shows and he also
makes his tail fan o ut. He then w ill
puff out his re el throat pa tch while
running along the perch and sings to
th e hen in ho pes of a ttract ing his
future mate. He will t1y to feed the hen
a couple of times before attempting to
mate with her.