QUAKERS
By Tracy Schwarztrauber
Origin and Habitat: South America (Bolivia to Uruguay and eastern Argentina). Natives call it the “Calita.” They spend the entire year in colonies, including breeding seasons. High in trees, they construct colonial nests often up to 6-1/2 feet to 9-1/2 feet tall, which are shared by several pairs. Males gather twigs up to pencil size diameter and up to two feet long and bring them to the females who construct the nest with them. They put a roof so the final structure resembles a sphere. The nest is lined with grasses. If it is damaged by a storm, they repair it. They are ready for breeding at one year of age. The male guards the entrance while the female remains totally hidden throughout the incubation. The broods are usually four to six young.
They are unaffected by cold, being seen in winter, in nests on telephone lines as far north as Chicago. Because Quakers are twig chewers and very destructive by nature, they are illegal to own as pets in several states in order to preserve farmlands and crops from destruction.
When acquiring a young hand-raised Quaker, they are sweet and snuggly, but this will change temporarily within the first year as they molt and mature. I recommend perch training, taking a six-inch long dowel and teaching the bird to step up on it as well as teaching the bird to step up on your hand. Both these should be taught at a very young age. Mounting a perch on the cage door is also a good idea—teach the bird to come down on this perch when taking him out of the cage and then have him step up on a dowel or your hand. Using the dowel will allow you to get the bird out and away from the cage without being bitten. As Quakers reach maturity (around one year), their personalities become sweet again and usually stay sweet as long as they receive proper care and attention, however they may remain cage protective. A well-socialized Quaker can make a wonderful pet. Their talking abilities will amaze you and they will be enjoyable to listen to, some having quite a large vocabulary. They will mimic noises they hear (telephone ringing, microwave, dogs barking, etc.).
They are quite the little architects, so when keeping one as a pet, I recommend a toy box in the cage, filled with little movable items, talon toys (mine even has baby rattles), cat balls, wood beads, etc. They will spend the day emptying the box, moving toys around the cage, then putting them back in the box and moving the box around. It’s fun to watch this busy bird. My Quaker (Maggie) loves her little 12-inch wooden ladder. The first two lasted about three months each, all rungs being chewed out and left as wood pieces. Now, her ladder gets moved all about the cage, and plastic chains hanging from cage top are woven through the ladder. The cutest thing to see is her maneuvering the ladder all over with her beak, setting it up on cage bars, climbing it, only to rearrange it again. She always seems to be on a mission to move everything around, creating a new little environment for the moment.
Maggie has always enjoyed company, so at home I carried her on a basket from room to room with me, talking to her. If you would like a talking bird, a Quaker is an excellent choice, and you must teach it to talk, which is not difficult.
Covering the birdcage at night is always a good idea for anyone who would like to sleep past dawn. Birds require 10-12 hours sleep each night anyway, so you can uncover them when you wake up and listen to them talk all morning!
My little Maggie has spent all seven of her years as my pet and we have a wonderful bond. She completely trusts me and I her. Unfortunately, being in the bird business, I have been saddened by the large number of unwanted Quakers that people give up on. I believe this is because of lack of knowledge of bird behavior and no patience on the owner’s part. Birds bond very strongly to their owners and family and when they are passed from home to home, they lose trust in people, becoming aggressive and noisy from boredom because new owners are afraid of the bird. Time goes on and then by owners number five or six (many times the bird is only 2-3 years old), the bird hasn’t been handled, is very aggressive, and owner wants to release bird out the window. I believe if owner one or two had done a little research before committing to this pet, they would have never purchased a bird or would have a wonderful pet.
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