Indian Ringneck Parakeet, The Best Pet Parrot?

What up Flockers! In this video we're going to review the Indian Ring-necked Parakeet. Now these birds are a ton of fun because you see the videos of them just being little silly birds all over the internet. They just have some of the silliest voices with how they mimic things and they just have a very fun personality. Paired with a bunch of different colors that these guys come in, making them one of the most popular parrots in the hobby. Now these birds you may also know them as the Rose Ring Parakeet. And the reason they get their name the Ring-neck or the Rose Ring is because males have a very dominant black ring that goes around their neck kind of like a necklace. That really gives them a very distinct look on top of just the solid colors that they have. Now this right here is a common mutation you'll find with Indian Ring-necks. You see Indian Ring-necks come in all kinds of different colors. The stock green is just this vibrant beautiful green color that just screams that very exotic tropical rainforest kind of look. But then there's also this amazing blue mutation that just has this vibrant blue color to it. And even there it comes in different shades. Then there's a really cool like bluish purple kind of a color that you can find as well as like yellow. Which is like one of my favorites if I had one I would name that thing like after like a Chocobo from Final Fantasy because it's that yellow. And there's just more there's like whites, grays, and then there's even mixes where people mix the different colors. Seriously there are so many options when it comes to Indian Ring-necks. And that's partly why these birds are so popular. You just pick the color you want and there probably is something like it. The males are the ones that actually have the ring whereas the females will lack a ring or they'll just have a very faint like trace of a ring. So if you're very set on wanting like a ring-neck look to your Indian Ring-neck parakeet then you probably want to sex your parrot and find out if it's a male or a female. The ring really only shows up once they're about like a year old so it's gonna be a while before you actually know if you have a male or female visually. But if you're a person who doesn't really care and you're just buying a baby parrot and you're good with both looks then you know props to you and you'll find out after like a year or so. But my best description of owning one of these birds is gonna be like you have a very like bossy hyperactive cat because they have such a unique fun personality that's really unlike any other parrot in the parrot world. And I mean you talk to Indian Ring-neck owners and they won't shut up about their Indian Ring-necks. Now the Indian Ring-neck comes to us from all over Asia basically but most predominantly India which is where it gets its name the Indian Ring-neck. And this baby albino Indian Ring-neck comes to us from Omar's Exotic Birds which is my go-to pet store here in Southern California because they're the only place that actually lets the birds out like a petting zoo so birds and humans learn that they can coexist as one flock. And it's why I got the majority of my flock from that store. Now while they did not sponsor this video they were kind enough to loan me this parrot for this review so for that guys thank you so much. Now these birds have a lifespan of about 30 years give or take which is about average for a medium-sized parrot like this. But now what's really interesting is just the history regarding these Indian Ring-necks. You see in ancient times when humans discovered that Indian Ring-necks could talk and they could talk really really well they actually ended up becoming like sacred symbols and sacred animals in a lot of ancient Asian religions as early as 200 BC possibly even earlier. But another really interesting thing about these birds is during that time when England and just Europe was trading with Asia the West was quickly learning about these Indian Ring-necks that were being kept as pets and as such it is heavily hypothesized that the whole stereotype of pirates having a parrot on their shoulder today we often picture like a macaw on a pirate shoulder but actually it was heavily believed that it was Indian Ring-necks that were actually the original pirate bird. And the last fun fact about these birds is they're also such a pest actually in Asia that they're known to raid poppy seed farms where the birds will eat the poppy seeds in order to get high. Yes these birds can sometimes be addicted to drugs don't do drugs kids. But aside all of this the real question and why you're here is you want to know if this parrot is going to be the right pet for you. So to break this down we have our six categories which are going to be handleability, quietness, talking ability, care, hardiness, and upfront costs. Now if you're a fan of Indian Ring-necks please make sure you hit the like button for the YouTube algorithm especially if you want more and more people to learn about how amazing Indian Ring-necks are. And my goal with this channel is to review every single parrot in existence so if you want to help me along my journey or follow along and not miss any videos please make sure you hit the subscribe button. And with that let's go ahead and get started. So first up is going to be handleability and for handleability I give the Indian Ring-neck a score Now here's the thing these birds are so incredibly fun they're super inquisitive they talk they play games they'll give you little kisses and they're just really fun. Now they're not going to be a cuddly parrot they're still kind of lower on the food chain in the wild which is kind of why they're a little more skittish kind of like a cockatiel but I would say probably not as bad as a cockatiel but they still have a somewhat skittish personality but they will take scritches once you earn their trust they will easily just take scritches and you can like pet them and they will really enjoy that a lot and then they will just stay on your shoulder all the time and just want to spend time with you and just be overall silly with you. So overall they actually would make really really good pets but the reason I don't give them that high of a score is because they have something called a bluffing phase it's basically when your parrot turns into a nasty little teenager as the parrot is growing older and going through adolescence and during this bluffing phase your bird is going to turn into a little demon it's going to be very mean it's going to be very nippy bitey it's gonna seem like the bird just overnight suddenly hates your guts and unfortunately even though this is just a temporary phase this is one of the reasons why a lot of indian ringnecks get rehomed by beginners who don't understand this bluffing phase and this goes all the way back to ancient times when religious leaders and kings would keep these birds as pets the reason why they were just relegated to being stuck in cages all the time is they didn't realize that the bluffing stages were actually just a temporary phase with these birds and if you worked through it they actually turned into one of the sweetest pets you can possibly get it just wasn't known back then so for the fact that for hundreds of years people didn't even know that these birds would even make good friendly pets really speaks a little bit about how bad their bluffing stage can be but keep in mind it's just a temporary thing it generally will last of about just maybe like a few months to maybe a year which sure that's gonna suck but when you have an animal that's going to be living for 30 years with you even a year-long bluffing phase isn't going to be that bad in the grand scheme of things because you're going to have an amazing pet right afterwards you're going to have to invest a lot of training into this bird during that bluffing phase to get the insanely sweet birds that you see all over the internet and this is one of the reasons why as nice as adopting birds are indian ringnecks generally don't make good adopted pets because by the time that they're up for adoption they've already kind of solidified into just being a very mean aggressive bird and it's very unlikely without a lot of work to actually retain an indian ringneck so as such i do strongly recommend if you get an indian ringneck you should buy it as a baby and you should work through that bluffing phase together and as such i do not recommend these birds for beginners i think that they are a lot better for experienced bird people who know how to read body language and don't mind having a bloody hand for a while from all the biting that they're gonna have to deal with but this is largely why you're gonna notice indian ringneck people tend to be really diehard fans with these birds and i personally think that a large reason for that is because indian ringneck people had to put a lot of work into their bird to get them to that point and then it's just so rewarding so it's gonna be a hard bird in the beginning to keep but you put in the work and you're gonna get reward with one of the best pets you can possibly get so next up on this list is going to be quietness and for quietness i give the indian ringneck a score of two out of five now these birds aren't going to be quiet birds partly the big appeal to them is just how expressive they are i mean they're going to be like doing really funny screams and a lot of talking and they're going to be just really expressive when they're doing all their sounds but they are also pretty needy birds they definitely need a lot of attention so like when you're out of the room they're going to be screaming for you so they're going to be a noisy parrot absolutely and as such i do not recommend these birds for apartments now some people maybe with like really thick walls or really good insulation or maybe you put some soundproofing in your home some people have made it work but generally from what i've seen with people who keep these in apartments their neighbors know that they have a parrot it's pretty obvious but granted as most of the time they're probably going to be talking they may be tolerable so it really just depends on your neighbors but personally i wouldn't really take the risk next up on this list though is going to be talking ability and for that i give this bird a score of four out of five they're really really great talkers especially for like these like small medium birds normally like smaller birds don't have like the greatest vocabulary but these birds are able to memorize a lot of words and phrases and they are going to be talking very very frequently which is awesome of course the general rule of thumb is the noisier the bird the better talker they are but here's the thing about this bird if you're looking for an accurate talker then this bird isn't going to be that accurate like you're going to know it's a very parody type of voice but the reason i have the talking ability rated so high is whereas other parrots in this size generally have a very scratchy or low volume kind of sound to it indian renex are super super clear but they're pitched really really high in a super cute way i mean you just have to watch videos of these parrots talking and it's so cute they literally sound like it's like a cartoon bunny trying to talk to you so my opinion if you are looking for a colorful bird which there's plenty of colors to choose from and a bird that talks these birds are really great choices as long as you can work through that personality in the bluffing phase next up on this list is going to be care and for care i give the indian ring neck a score of three out of five so overall this bird is actually relatively simple to take care of now they do have a long tail they are a parakeet so you're definitely going to want to get a larger cage for this kind of bird as opposed to some other medium-sized birds but these birds are a little more flighty so i would actually say like a longer flight style cage would probably be better for this type of bird so it has room to like move around and fly in its cage but then as far as like diet goes you just put this bird on your normal pellet diet with some fruits and veggies and you're pretty much fine but the main thing to point out about these birds is going to be that asiatic parrots are old world birds and they are going to be dusty birds and indian ringnecks are no exception so i would definitely recommend getting maybe like a hepa filter next to the cage or something just because you're not going to want that dust flying all over your house now they're not as like dusty as like a cockatiel in my opinion but it's still going to be a dusty bird so you want to be a little careful with that if you do have allergies in fact if you have allergies you probably might want to avoid this bird unfortunately but when these birds are tamed after that bluffing phase upkeeping them isn't going to be that bad you know you want to spend at least a couple hours a day with them obviously the more the better but like these birds are going to be a little less maintenance than some other more hyperactive birds so they're relatively low maintenance except for just that whole bluffing phase thing which you are going to have to work through but again if you can work through that bluffing phase you're going to have a very rewarding bird for the next 30 years now next up on this list is going to be hardiness and for hardiness i give this bird a score of four out of five they're very hardy birds which is why they're all over asia i mean given a little time to acclimate and they can tolerate all kinds of weather they're also just a pretty decent medium sized bird a pretty decent build kind of a slender build but i'm not too worried about things like crushing they will be able to handle just in case there's like minor accidents or things around your home or maybe a grabby kid these birds will be able to handle it though they do not like rough handling so they will scurry away from that as they are kind of a skittish personality but overall they're pretty tough and they can survive a lot of different things and i'm not too concerned about them next up on this list is going to be upfront cost and for upfront cost i'm gonna give this bird a score of three but really it can kind of range between like a four and three it's kind of around there and it mainly just depends on which indian ringneck you're gonna get now if you get the stock green color that most indian ringnecks come as they're gonna be really really affordable at around like maybe like the five hundred dollar range but once you start getting into the mutations like the purples the blues the albinos the mixed color ones the price is really gonna shoot up there and they can shoot up to a whopping two thousand dollars for what is normally just a five hundred dollar bird so the price is definitely very much all over the place and you're just gonna have to look at your budget and determine you know which color suits your budget but aside from that then you just end up getting like a flight style cage you do want a good medium size cage but this being kind of like a smaller medium size they don't need an insane amount of room though again as usual you want to get the largest cage you can get and especially if you are a nine to five person then you definitely want to get a very large cage is the bird's gonna spend most of its time there but if you do get a smaller cage these guys will do okay just make sure you have most of the day they're out of the cage to stretch their wings and spend time with you and then aside from that they are very intelligent inquisitive birds so you still want to make sure you get plenty of toys in that cage throw them on that pellet diet and you know fruits and veggies which is just like any other bird which is going to be a upkeep and now comes our final score and a final score i give the indian ring neck parakeet is a score of 3.2 out of 5 it's actually a pretty solid score and an overall amazing parrot that you will develop a very solid lifelong companion with in my opinion they would literally be one of the perfect beginner parrots if it wasn't for their bluffing stage so even though their score so high it is something to consider their bluffing stage is going to be a big downer with the vast majority of first-time bird owners and unfortunately these birds do get rehomed a lot because people just don't understand the bluffing and just how bad that bluffing can get but these birds are definitely a special kind of special and if you just talk to any irn owner they will all agree and all fervently demand you to get an irn because they believe that they are the best possible bird there is if that sounds like the bird you want then this may be the right bird for you and with that guys thank you so much for watching make sure you like and subscribe and i'll see you next time