Cleaning your bird’s cage can seem like a tedious task with all the areas to scrub, bowls to wash, and liners to change. It can be difficult to even know where to start. However, keeping your bird’s cage and accessories clean are an important factor in their overall health.
Setting a cleaning schedule and sticking to a routine is essential to keeping your job as quick and simple as possible. Once you know which tasks need to be completed daily and which ones can be weekly or monthly, you can start to build a schedule and stick to it.
Daily Cleaning
- Wipe Down Everything. Remove the accessories and toys and clean up any loose food or droppings. Using a wet rag, wipe all the surfaces, including bars and perches. Use a bird-safe cleaner for any stuck-on messes. Dry thoroughly.
- Clean Accessories and Toys. Remove any droppings and disinfect with a mild bird-safe cleaner. Rinse and dry everything before putting it back in the cage. It’s helpful to have a backup set up perches and toys if time is an issue.
- Wash Food and Water Dishes. Harmful bacteria can easily grow in the dishes if they aren’t cleaned often.
- Change Cage Liner. Not cleaning the liner daily can not only get especially smelly, it’s very unhealthy and unsanitary for a bird to walk around in droppings. Avian Adventures cages feature a pull-out tray to make clean up simpler.
Weekly Cleaning
- Clean/Rotate Toys. Remove all toys from the cage and soak and scrub them. Rotating the selection of toys ensures that your bird won’t get bored.
- Clean Perches. Perches can be a bacteria breeding ground and should be soaked and scrubbed down once a week.
- Scrub the Grate. Dried droppings accumulate on the grate, so it needs to be scrubbed and sanitized to get rid of any build-up.
- Wash the Cage Tray. While the liner gets changed daily, the tray that it sits on should be scrubbed and sanitized weekly. Just make sure the tray is dry before adding the liner back.
Monthly Cleaning
This is the big one. This is where you’ll do a detailed cleaning of the entire cage. It’s easiest to take the cage outside and use a hose. A bathtub and showerhead can work too if you can’t clean it outside.
- Spray on a cage cleaner and scrub down all the bars and the base of the cage.
- Pay special attention to any cracks and crevices where there might be missing droppings or old food.
- Rinse completely to remove any remaining cleaner. Wipe the cage down with a towel to get it totally dry before putting your bird back inside.