At some point in your life you will have walked past a parrot and heard it screech ‘hello’ in a startlingly human voice. They are exceptionally clever animals capable of learning quite a vocabulary, but why is it they so easily imitate the sounds and words we use? Experts suggest parrots, like most animals, talk in order to communicate with others. If a young parrot is with its mother, it will of course learn the sounds the mother parrot makes, but if it is surrounded by human voices, it will consider its new environment to be home and start to mimic sounds.

Not all parrots are excellent speakers. Pet birds that are generally known for being capable of speaking are African Grey Parrots. They are capable of imitating humans to the point where they are almost indistinguishable from actual human speech. You have probably found yourself fooled by a parrot or two on some occasion!

Though parrots can use quite a list of words, they don’t understand the meaning to what they’re saying. Much like young parrots squawking for attention from their mother, parrots will make these vocalisations in order to evoke a response that grants them attention. They won’t understand the significance of the word itself, but they will understand the reaction or action that word results in.

If you would like to buy a bird that will talk, it’s a good idea to get a young bird and keep it alone in your home. Alternatively, find a bird that already knows how to talk! It’s much easier to teach them something new, compared with older, non-talking birds. They can be difficult to encourage to talk. Unfortunately, there is no guarantee that you will get a bird that is willing to have a conversation with you. Some birds just don’t talk and you will have to accept that.  Just like any other pet, they deserve every ounce of love and attention, and not just for their oratory skill.