🦜 Vet’s 2025 Guide to Complete Macaw & Amazon Parrot Care: Nutrition, Breeding & Behaviour 🩺

By Dr. Duncan Houston BVSc

Welcome, fellow bird lovers! 🐦 If you're caring for a macaw or amazon parrot—or considering welcoming one into your home—this expert guide dives deep into their care, behaviour, dietary needs, and breeding requirements for 2025. This is your ultimate manual for raising healthy, joyful, and well-adjusted feathered companions. 💚

🌿 Introduction: Macaws & Amazons in the Wild

Macaws and Amazons are native to South America and known for their vibrant plumage, social intelligence, and impressive vocal skills. In the wild, these parrots engage in intricate foraging routines and social behaviors, which we must replicate in captivity for optimal well-being. 🌎

🧠 Characteristics & Special Needs

Macaws are:

• 💪 Large and strong-beaked—requiring durable toys and daily foraging outlets
• 🗣️ Great talkers, preferring contextual communication over mimicry
• ❤️ Deeply bonded with their humans and often other birds in multi-pet households
• 🔊 Loud by nature—but calm and quiet when given structure, love, and stimulation
• 🎓 Highly trainable and emotionally sensitive—capable of gratitude, joy, and trust

Before bringing home a macaw, consider:

• 🏠 Can you offer enough space and enrichment daily?
• 📆 Are you ready for a lifelong commitment (up to 65 years)?
• 🕐 Can you provide daily, supervised cage-free time?

🥦 Daily Feeding Routine

Macaws thrive on variety and whole food nutrition—not pellets or seed-heavy diets. An ideal feeding routine includes:

🌞 Morning Meal

• Sweet potato, pumpkin, carrot, chickpeas, corn, green peas, grapefruit
• High GI for morning energy boost

🌜 Evening Meal

• Tassie's Organic Bean Mix with boiled brown rice
• Supplements: Turbobooster, E-Powder, F-Vite

Fresh, filtered water should always be available 💧, and food served in stainless steel dishes for hygiene 🧼. Avoid: 🥜 peanuts, 🌻 sunflower seeds (due to mold contamination risks).

🌞 Sunshine & Social Time

Daily exposure to natural sunlight is essential. Macaws should be placed in outdoor aviaries or sunny spots to absorb Vitamin D and maintain hormonal balance. ☀️ They thrive in a multi-bird environment and benefit from positive flock dynamics. 🦜🦜

🗓️ Daily Routine Tips

Structure builds confidence. Macaws become content and calm with routines including:

• 🪴 Foraging before and after meals
• 💬 Morning talking or training sessions
• 🚗 Outdoor time or car rides with companions
• 🎶 Music or enrichment during human absences
• 🎯 Evening calm-down and cuddles before bedtime

🧪 Weekly Health & Nutrition Protocol

Routine maintenance keeps birds thriving. Weekly must-haves include:

• 🧴 Use KD Water Cleanser in water once a week
• 🔁 Supplement rotation: Quik Gel, Turbobooster, E Powder, F-Vite, Dufoplus, Ioford
• 🪵 Regular provision of destructible branches and foraging setups

🔬 Biannual Health Check-Up

Macaws should receive vet checkups twice a year:

• December 1st: Pre-moult health screen
• June 1st: Pre-breeding season readiness check

Testing Includes:

• 💩 Faecal Wet Smear, Gram Stain, and Culture
• 🦠 Choanal Culture for throat health
• 🧪 Psittacosis Test
• 🩸 Blood test for liver, cholesterol, and organ function
• 🐛 Worm, lice, and mite treatment

🐣 Breeding Programme Insights

Macaw breeding success relies on timing with moult and seasonal patterns. Two key groupings:

Hyacinth & Red Fronted

• 🌱 Spring breeders
• 🗓️ Start breeding after June 22nd
• 🧼 Needs complete moult (Nov–April) for best outcomes

Scarlet, Blue & Gold, Green Wing

• 🌴 Autumn & Spring breeders
• 📆 Breeding from Jan–Feb in south, or July onwards in north
• 🥚 Remove second clutches before cold to protect health

🦜 Behavioural Traits & Enrichment

Macaws are intelligent and socially complex. They benefit from structured interaction and enrichment, including:

• 🧠 Training with positive reinforcement and praise
• 🧸 Toys that encourage claw and beak dexterity
• 🧩 Puzzles and destructible foraging materials
• 🎵 Enjoying music and routine human interaction
• 🚗 Participating in travel and changes of scenery

📲 Get Support From Ask A Vet

For personal care tips and health guidance tailored to your parrot, visit AskAVet.com or download the Ask A Vet app. 🐦 Our team of avian professionals is here to help you and your macaw thrive—every step of the way. 📱💚