Bird Cage Accessories

A single type of perch, used exclusively, puts constant pressure on exactly the same part of a bird's foot, which can lead to sore feet over time — much like a person wearing identical shoes every day rather than varying them. Mixing rope, natural wood and different diameters gives a bird's feet a genuinely healthier range of grip.

Natural branch-style perches also tend to vary in thickness along their length, unlike a uniform dowel perch, which more closely matches what a bird's feet would experience gripping branches in the wild.

Birds are intelligent, active animals, and a cage with nothing to do in it leads to boredom, and sometimes to behavioural problems like excessive feather plucking. Chewable, foraging and preening toys all give a bird something constructive to do with the time they spend in the cage.

Rotate toys periodically rather than leaving the same ones in permanently — like most pets, birds can lose interest in something that's been there for months, and reintroducing it later often works better than buying something new every time.

A bird-safe disinfectant, used regularly on perches, food and water containers and cage surfaces, matters more here than with most pets, since birds are sensitive to a lot of standard household cleaning products and their fumes lingering in an enclosed space.

Clean water and food containers daily rather than topping them up, since residue builds up quickly and birds are particularly susceptible to bacterial and fungal problems from anything left to fester in a bowl over several days.