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Pet Conures, The Family-Friendly Pet Birds
Check out the pet conure, a great pet bird for families.
By Rebecca Sweat
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By Cioli & Hunnicutt/Bowtie Studio/Courtesy Kelly & Karl Neill
The green-cheeked conure is in the Pyrrhura genus. Its scientific name is Pyrrhura molinae.
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There are more than 100 species and subspecies of conures, comprising five genera: Aratinga, Enicognathus, Pyrrhura and Cyanoliseus. Only a fraction of these species are commonly kept as pets in the United States. These include:
Aratinga genus:
Jenday conure Sun conure Mitred conure Blue-crowned conure Dusky-headed conure White-eyed conureOrange-fronted conure Peach-fronted conureNanday conure
Pyrrhura genus:
Green-cheeked conure Maroon-bellied conure Painted conureBlue-throated conureBlack-capped conure
Enicognathus genus:Slender-billed conureAustral conure
Cyanoliseus genus:Patagonian conure
Many bird breeders are quick to note the “family potential” of conures. One is Anna Kasho of California. She doesn’t call them great pets for just any family though. Rather, “for those willing to deal with the noise, mess, more noise and a few occasional nips, conures can be fantastic,” she said. “They are more challenging than a budgie or a cockatiel, but even at their worst, they are not big enough to inflict permanent damage like a larger psittacine. They have close social bonds in the flock, and this carries over to their human family.”
A pet conure will typically adopt the family of people and pets in the household as members of its flock, and will join right in with the laughter, play and activities in the household.
Some conures, like Jennifer Skaptason’s sun conure, TJ, are happy not only interacting in an average-sized household of two to five people, but a whole classroom of children. Skaptason is a teacher for a Montessori school in Minnesota. Each year, she has an average of 20 children in her classroom, ranging in age from 2½ and 6½ years old. TJ comes with her to school every day and has his own cage in the back of the classroom
“TJ basically serves as the class mascot,” Skaptason said. During much of the school day, the bird perches on different children while they do their school work. The children are also allowed time each day to care for the bird — to clean out his cage, give him fresh food and water, teach him tricks, sing to him or just hold him. “TJ loves being with the children,” Skaptason said. “He will start singing as soon as we pull up to the school parking lot, because he knows he’s going to school to meet up with the flock.
Conures can also build attachments to other birds in the household. However, when it comes to cats and dogs, conures are often a little less friendly. There aren’t many examples of conures becoming actual “buddies” with dogs or cats, because after all, conures are prey animals and dogs and cats are predators. Certainly, though, most conures can learn to see the family dog or cat as fellow members of the household, and they may get a certain kind of enjoyment out of interacting with them from a safe distance.
Their interactive and sociable nature is one of the things that really lends conures to being ideal pets for families. “When you’ve got a conure, it’s going to be an active part of the family. It’s not going to be content just being there in the background,” said Lisa McManus, a conure breeder in Colorado and a board member of the International Conure Association.
Conures have other “family friendly” qualities as well. Although there are always individual exceptions, most conures are extremely playful, affectionate, easy-going, fun-loving, resilient and cuddly
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Pet Conures, The Family-Friendly Pet Birds
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