Blue and Gold Macaw Videos

Last winter, I birdy-sat a beautiful Blue and Gold Macaw named Jo.  I think she was about 20 years old, so she knew a lot of words.  She also seemed to use a lot of words in appropriate contexts.  For example, at sometime in her past, she lived with someone who had a dog, although her current owner didn’t have a dog.  The poor dog must have been scolded a lot, since Jo would sometimes scold our dog when he appeared.  I doubt she knew what “Bad Dog! Stop that! No!” meant, but she knew that people sometimes said that when a dog was around.  So, she’d say that when my dog, Pharaoh, came by.  I don’t scold Pharaoh, so he wasn’t sure what “Bad dog! No!” meant and would just hang around while Jo told him he was bad.

She could say, “Bad Cats!” as well (and sometimes said this at Pharaoh and the other dogs).  The dogs barely noticed the huge, talking bird, while the cats were utterly spooked out by her.

Jo would also say, “Mmmmm,” while eating food which was quite cute. She loved to sing as well. I got a lot of this on tape, so here are a few short clips:

Jo scolds Pharaoh the dog (although she’s saying “Bad Cats!” here).

Jo the Macaw sings to herself.

Jo eats and comments on the food