The time man has caged pet birds is minute compared to how long theyve been around. Wild or tame, i think theyre knowledge is hardwired over thousands and thousands of years. At what point will parent birds be tamed out of knowing how to care for and raise young? It wont ever happen. Its in their dna.
Plenty of birds completely fail at being parents, including wild birds. I don't understand the point. Birds, like any other animal (or human) can do things detrimental to their health.
The point is, captivity isnt going to change natural instincts encoded in dna. Of course there are exceptions to the rule just like anything.
I would go as far as to say that many natural instincts are learned behaviors. A bird who is clipped before they are fully fledged is unlikely to be a strong or confident flier, they may not even know they have wings. This is something they would learn and be taught, like being taught by their parents what foods are safe etc. I wouldn't put something that risks impaction in an animals cage just because they *might* know better. Odds are they don't even need the extra calcium if they have a balanced diet. Or you could give them eggshells or another healthy alternative.
I do not believe everything is hardwired, take flight for example- yes it is hardwired to wish to fly and try it but it has also been shown/recognised that birds who are not allowed to fledge naturally do not ever fly as well as those who were allowed to naturally fledge, there are also apparently other things they have issues with like mapping, skills for different situations, reflexes etc many things need to be learned through experience at certain ages to be perfected and others are passed from parent to young in the way of showing them, I do think some things are in the DNA just as they are with humans but even when human children miss certain milestones for speech for example they will never be able to perfect the sounds needed for them to speak without an obvious issue.
