Clipping a bird before it fledges (learns to fly as a baby) can negatively impact the development of its brain, vision, motor skills, bones, behaviour, and flight ability later in life. If a bird is clipped, the age at which it is clipped, the amount of time it is kept clipped for, and the type of clip will all determine how it is affected. Both The Center for Avian & Exotic Medicine in New York and Brisbane Bird Vet in Australia do not recommend clipping/trimming wings as a part of routine care and instead advocate for providing bird owners the information they need to give flight proper consideration. The Ark Veterinary Clinics in Scotland does not clip or trim wings, stating that “wing clipping is unnecessary and can lead to serious long term behavioural and medical problems”. Indeed, more and more exotic and avian veterinarians are gradually moving away from clipping for this very reason, preferring to educate bird owners on the care of flighted birds instead. This disability has unfortunate consequences for both physiological and psychological well-being. Thus, in clipping a bird’s wings, we are assigning it a tangible, bodily disability with which it was not born. Restrict or eliminate flight and the bird is no longer able to move in a biologically appropriate way. Their brains, bones, muscles, organs, and entire bodies are structured specifically for flight. Parrots, whether born in the wild or in captivity, have the same biological impulse to fly. “They grow back” is a vague and misleading statement which prevents bird owners from understanding the true nature of wing clipping. The fact that he has been rehabilitated to flight is a product not only of time, but of his owner’s efforts to teach him. Two years after his wing was clipped, this galah is still missing four flight feathers. A bird relies on its wings for normal movement, transportation, and exercise–we don’t rely on our hair or nails for any of those things.
Clipping a bird’s flight feathers alters the aerodynamic shape of their wings, which directly affects their mobility. Even though flight feathers do grow back (in most cases), that is where the similarity ends. It is, however, completely inaccurate to compare wing clipping to a haircut or a nail trim.
One of the most widely circulated myths in the bird world is that clipping a parrot’s wings is temporary and harmless, just like a haircut or a nail trim. In order to answer whether or not a parrot should have its wings clipped, it is necessary to address some of the misconceptions concerning the practice of wing clipping. Does an animal perfectly adapted to using flight as its primary means of locomotion suffer no consequences when this ability is taken away or severely restricted? Is wing clipping really necessary to keep these birds safe in captivity, or is that belief based on old-fashioned assumptions and a lack of information? Moreover, and more controversially: is it cruel to clip a bird’s wings? Credit: Monika of PH&FF UK.
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