Despite international trade restrictions, hundreds of thousands of parrots are captured from the wild each year. The mortality and suffering involved in the illegal trade are devastating.
The suffering involved in wild parrot capture and trade is extreme. Captured birds experience intense stress, confinement in dark containers, dehydration, and disease during smuggling. Mortality during transit is high. Parent birds may be killed to access nest chicks. Birds that survive to reach buyers are often physically and psychologically damaged. The welfare harm is compounded by the conservation consequence: several parrot species have been driven to extinction or near-extinction by collection for the pet trade. Buying captive-bred parrots from verified sources is the only way to avoid contributing to this trade.