The best toys for most animals are those that can be destroyed. For birds, toy destruction is a way to channel aggravation and frustration while in their cage. In a future post I will write about this further with respect to the self-mutilation that birds will do if they have no distraction from boredom and frustration.

Unfortunately, destructible toys cost money. The more destructible the toy, the more the bird enjoys it, and the more often you have to spend money to replace the toy.

Commercial toys are nicer to look at than homemade toys, yet homemade toys can offer hours of entertainment for your pet bird. They don’t care about how a toy looks. All that matters is how easily they can shred, puncture, or fragment it.

I started stringing together toys for our birds years ago out of wood and plastic trinkets that I bought online from a bird store. The idea was to use these components to build your own toys.

I eventually realized that I could get most of the same things from the dollar store or even a hardware store — much cheaper and with many more options.

Here’s my workshop:

And here are some resulting bird toys:

There are bits and pieces of rawhide and wood and rope from other toys that were previously mutilated. I add in telephone books, PVC piping, and pieces of hemlock and cedar from the trees around our place. I’ve used birch to make their perches.

Everything is destructible, everything is fun.

Our birds have the same zest for these toys as my cousins did when they would come over for our family parties and destroy my brother’s toys.

Yeah, you know who you are…