Lories and Lorikeets

Tex and KathyMcKinney are lory breeders who manage their flock of lories in the Bronx, New York City. They, and their flock, gave an extremely informative and interesting presentation to B.A.B.A. members.

In addition to Tex and Kathy, we had a chance to visit with several of their flock:

Along with two bald blue-streaked babies, almost 2 months old, hatched March 15, and March 18. Tex explained that during this stage of their feather growth almost all the head feathers molt at once, to make room for the silky, new adult head feathers. Tex and Kathy also were accompanied by tiny babies, still being hand-fed.

All lories are from the South Pacific, and are distinguished from all other psitticines by their brush tongues. The brushes are made of papillae, and are used in removing nectar from flowers. The lory diet is primarily of fruit and nectar in the wild. Lories should never be fed the standard psitticine seed mix; they are not equipped to digest it properly, and it will eventually cause health problems.

Lories are all natural clowns. You don't need to buy them expensive toys; they are perfectly happy playing with anything around the house -- paper towel rolls, toilet paper rolls, anything plastic, anything acrylic, a paper towel rolled and knotted, anything that will make a noise. Everything is a possible lory toy. Tex and Kathy do not use rope toys; they have had incidents of the lories becoming entangled. They do use leather. Lories will lie on their backs and play with a ball for hours; they will play with several toys at the same time.

Lories have a reputation for being messy because their nectar-based diet causes a liquid feces. Tex feels that lory areas are actually easier to clean, because their waste stays soft and can be mopped up or wiped off, rather than hardening and having to be scraped off.

Lories love baths. If you provide a bath, they will usually bathe every day. They soak to the skin, and look like drowned rats after they bathe. If you provide a large enough bath container, they will actually swim across the container.

Tex and Kathy feed a lory nectar mix, along with a fruit and vegetable mix, in the morning. The vegetables used are of corn, peas, carrots, and string beans, all steamed. The fruits in the mix are two kinds of apple, pears, kiwis, and grapes. They have begun adding greens to the mixture and find that the birds' over-all condition and feather condition have improved. The lories seem to love red kale. The nectar is replaced in the afternoon with juice or water. The dry powder and fruits and vegetables are available at all times. The lory powders are still controversial; Tex and Kathy feel that some are good, and some are only mediocre. The McKinneys' lories do not like lory sized pellets, which are very small. They prefer parrot sized pellets. The ingredient which is distinctive in lory pellets is fruit sugar; if you feed lories sufficient fruit, they do not need the additional fruit sugar from pellets, so it is safe to feed a standard parrot pellet mix. The major message for a healthy lory is variety. Do not feed 100% of anything. Give access to fruits, vegetables, powder, and pellets.

Baby lories are easy to hand feed. You do not need a syringe and don't need to wait for the baby to "pump." They will eat from a spoon or paper cup, and will swallow correctly. Paper cups are easy to use; and make it easy to assure that sanitation standards are met. Tex and Kathy use Pretty Bird 8% rice handfeeding mix, mixed with lemon yogurt, Beechnut baby food (any of the mixed meat dinners) and water to thin, at 106F. If you use a microwave, watch for hot spots which can burn a baby's crop. Be sure the mix is evenly heated by stirring vigorously before taking the temperature.

Various lories have different temperaments; the blue-streaked lories seem to remain sweet tempered; some of the other species can become nippy.

Tex and Kathy finished a wonderful presentation by demonstrating hand feeding techniques, including proper weighing and record keeping.