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Ain't that funny, my kid brother's getting a keet too, and I've done alot of research (who really does the work anyway).

One of the most important things to remember is: buy at least 2. It's the same concept you use towards tetras, or danois, or barbs. Parakeets live in flocks in the wild and will get lonely or die if left alone. Unless you are a stay-at-home mom or an elderly person, or otherwise someone who never leaves the house for extended periods, I would buy 2. The only down side is that they won't be as easily trained.

By training, I mean: speaking, whistling, and allowing you to pet it. Remember, parakeets can be as smart as some parrots in they're ability to learn words, but this depends on the actual animal and the amount of work you put into it.

Also, males are supposedly smarter (is it really that hard to believe ) and can learn words quicker. You can tell the sex by the color of the skin around th bird's beak. Above the beak is the part of the head with the nostrols. This section will be blue if a guy and brown if a gal. Many times you will see purple ones, which are either too immature to sex, or extremely gender confused . It's hard to sex these, so think of them as a surprise.

The best approach to training is to buy a young bird. You can tell the age of the bird by the amount of stripes on the bird's head. More stripes covering the head all the way to the beak means the bird is younger. No stripes, or some faded ones means older.

The bird should have it's wings clipped. Although some pro's suggest against it, most of us normal folks would have trouble training a flying bird. The problem with a non-clipped parakeet is that it would rather fly away from us that sit on our hand. Plus, a parakeet will be calmer knowing there is no way to escape rather than being able to fly, but not allowed to by the keeper. Fortunately, the wing-clipping is painless and blodless and is the bird's equivalent of a haircut. The wings will eventually grow back, but it will take some time. This allows plenty of time to train your new friend. If you do it right, the parakeet will not fly away from you, even if it has the ability.

To train the bird, you have to spend alot of time with it. Keep the animal in a room with alot of people so he gets used to them. If the bird is not accustomed to humans, it will get scared whenever it sees one. Be sure to spend about 4 10-25 min. periods with the bird, over the course of a day. You don't have to keep this up after it is trained, but you should take it out of the cage once a day to excercize.

My brother's dream is the get the bird to sit on his shoulder. Fortunately, this is the fist and easiest step in parakeet training. First, after the parakeet has been your house for 4 - 5 days and has adjusted itself, slowly and gently put your hand in to the cage and coak the bird to hop onto you. This could take weeks, but eventually the bird should warm up to you. Eventually, you can walk around the house with the bird on you shoulder or hand. In reality, this is more of a neccesity than a nice trick. It will allow you to be able to clean the cage and do other maintinance without freaking the bird out.

Past this you can teach your bird to imitate sounds, and even words. Now, unless you are the kind of person that never leaves the house and constantly has time to give (like my dear old auntie) you should nto get your hopes up. Needless to say, I have little experience in this field, and IMO it's not that important as you should be focusing more on the basics right now. Once you're a pro, you can learn the trick and maybe even teach me .

Now, once your bird is used to you and your surroundings (this should take between several weeks to several months )you can buy it a friend! The good part is that your origional bird will remember it's training and will still show affection for you, even if there is another bird present (unlike those *^%$& lovebirds) If you want, you could even get another bird, like a cocatiel(sp.) although 2 parakeets is always better.

A pair (1m, 1 f) is best. I'd get the male first, because it is easier to train, and the female second, because males may fight. I'd only buy 2 males if it is a large cage in question with lots of girls to go around. 2 females is ok, but I still like a pair better. You could give them cute names like romeo and juliette or bonnie and clyde . Also, you might get babies (if you don't want them, you could always give them to friends or stores). Besides, you wouldn't want to spend you life with another dude (or chick, in some cases). Like people, birds have certain "needs", which, if uncared for, can make the bird unhappy or sick.

I know I'm really going on, but I just want to cover one more topic: The cage. There are 3 kinds sold on the market: $30 ones(small), $50 ones(med.), and $70 ones(large). If you are only planning on housing 1 bird (NOT RECCOMENDED) a small will suffice. For a pair a med. or large will do. If you want a flock (4-5 individuals) get a large cage. There are also tall cages used for parrots of finches on the market, which usually run in the $100 range. These, I would not suggest because they have the same footprint (heh, heh fish terms) are a large cage. Like fish, birds prefer length and width over height. Square enclosers are better than round because they have corners where the birds can hide.

Now, and without further adue, I wish you good luck with your new pet.

oh yes, I forgot, my sisters old class had a cockateal (??) & it kept us up all night

Just one tip.

Parakeets can be deafeningly[ loud. Some even more so than Cockatiels and Lovebirds. Although they've still some way to go to exceed the ear-splitting cacophony emitted by Palm Cockatoos. Those things can screech at about 120 decibels. In their native rainforest home, Palm Cockatoos can be heard two miles away. They're actually noisier than Huey helicopters, and that's saying something!

Oh, and as for Rosellas, well they're gorgeous to look at, but again, they can compete with some mid-range car stereos in the volume department. Having said that, I think I'd prefer a flock of Rosellas outside my window to some of the execrable noises emitted from the car stereos of the local teens


Panda Catfish fan and keeper/breeder since Christmas 2002

NAME IT BASIL

I go to a few Australian bird sites but I think it might be better to go for something that's closer to home for bird forums because of availability and possible local problems.
I looked around myself and this one ...[link=http://www.parrotlinks.com/forum2/default.asp]http://www.parrotlinks.com/forum2/default.asp" style="COLOR: #4778C7[/link] looked good, they seemed helpful and friendly and knew what they were talking about. I hope it helps and good luck with your new bird