Question:I've had my sun conure for two years. My African Grey sang and whistled beautifully, my cockatiel whistles and says "pretty bird," but my sun conure just screetches. Will she ever do anything other than imitate my laughing? Has anyone ever seen a sun conure that can talk?
Answers:
Yes, all of my conures have been good talkers. The best way to teach them that I've found is to say the phrase you want them to say every time you come in the room in the same tone of voice that you would say "hi (name)". This doesn't take long before the bird will repeat the phrase because it knows that the phrase is something that you like to say TO the bird. Talking TO birds is always better than talking AT birds. None of that "you're such a pretty bird" stuff. I hope she starts to talk.
yes, my daughter had one who said many words.
Do you keep your birds in the same room?
Usually the best way to teach a bird to talk is from another bird.
Sun conures can be taught to talk, but the species in general are known to be poor talkers.
It depends on the individual bird too.
we have 2 quakers and a sunday conure. Our quakers are very clear, and say alot of words and phrases. Our conure, is very high-pitched, so even when he talks it isn't very clear. He only says a few words "step-up", "Nigh-night", and "good boy". Alot of the conure species are the same way. They say the clearest, and those with best speaking ability are the blue-crowned. Everyone I know that has a sun (or sunday hybrid) says the same thing, they say only a few things and not very clearly. My pita (our conure) certainly is great at screetching to, he borders on shrill!
I have known Suns that talk up a storm. But all birds are individuals and some choose to talk while others of the same species don't. My White Eyed Conure is a very good talker where as my Green Cheek Conure tries to imitate the White Eyed, isn't as clear. He does kissy noises well, though.
Conures, with a few exceptions and those two are mine, screech. Suns are notorious for their loud screaming and is one of the reasons that they often end up in rescue centers and have multiple homes.
It has never been a requirement that my birds talk. Mikki, our White Eyed, was rehomed at age 15-years (because his human companion had died) and he came with a full vocabulary in a elderly man's voice. In the 18-months that we've had him, he has picked up additional phrases in my voice and we've not tried to teach him to talk. The phrases he has learned are those things we say to him all the time like "I love you".
If you buy a bird so that he'll perform and talk, you may end up disappointed in the end. The best talkers among parrots are the African Grey and any of the Amazons.
That is so ironic. My grandma bought her sun conure about 5 years ago and all it knows is one whishtle which it screeches all day long. I bought my green cheek conure 4 years ago and it talks like crazy...and it doesn't screech...it almost whispers which I really appreciate. Maybe the suns just aren't the talkers.
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