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Hi Everyone, It has been a long time since I have been on this post. I was reading my Bird Talk magazine and I saw a net playgym. Looks like so much fun for a fid. I was wondering if anyone owns one and if you like it. Razzle is basically out of her cage all day. She is only in her cage when no one is home or we are sleeping. She loves hanging out on her perch. Anyway I thought the net playgym would be so much fun but I have several concerns. Where could you possibly hang this in a home that would be convenient. How do you prevent a mess from the bird droppings... Do the birds really like playing with it. Any comments would be appreciated. Thanks.

Mine have been complete flops with my tiels and pionus, but I hear stories of birds who love theirs. There are endless ways to hang them. I'll come back with some sites that illustrate some ways. Birds need feeding first!

Scroll down a bit to see the pictures in this thread: http://www.parrotstrut.net/forums/viewt ... ping+ropes

Those look cute, I didn't see that in my birdtalk magazine. I bet Rosie would like that. In my bedroom I have one of those chain looking things that has the cord in it to my ceiling fan and when Rosie is in my room in my bed she likes to climb the chain.

We have a huge cargo net set up in our birdroom. It basically hangs from ceiling to floor and from one wall to the other. My husband put two heavy steele hooks in the ceiling and I can take one side down when I dont want it up{like when cleaning cages}. My cockatoo, macaw, Amazon and even our little lovebird really love it. We tied some small toys and some strips of leather onto it and they love it!! The big cargo nets are not cheap, Im fortunate enough to have a friend who was able to get it wholesale for me.

I bought a huge net that looks like a fishing net a while back (before I moved into my house). I haven't figured out how I'm going to hang it exactly so I haven't used it. I thought it looked like a fun play area for the birds though. The one I bought was fairly heavy and larger because I intended to used it for Greys and Cockatoos. Toys can also be hung on it, and I did buy one that they attached. It was too cute to resist - a fish on a hook for the fish net. I've decide to hang hooks in the archway so it can be up when they are using it and can be taken down easily. I plan to just use newspaper underneath.

I bought one for a pair of my macaws when I owned my bird store and could get one at a good price,which was still very costly. The macaws chewed all of the corner mounts off within two weeks and then every place that I used to mount it became a chew point. I suppose some birds aren't quite the chewers, but they are expensive to find on the floor of a cage being pooped on. Not my suggestion for most people. I heard pretty much the same from customers that bought them from me for their birds.

Denis

My birds love thiers. A few things though. My younger Too- (got her as a baby- M2) LOVES it! Hangs upside-down and flaps and has a great time. My older bird (U2- rescue) who is about 25 is too set in his ways (so far) to really "get into it". He doesn't seem to like the swinging sensation as he walks- he likes firm perches (what he has had up until now).
Also, when they spent part of their days in their cages and I would supervise time on the net- the net held up well. Now they have their own room and the nets are taking more of a beating, but I'm starting to put more toys on them, around them and above them, so they won't be the main chewing focus. That seems to be working. If its just use like a playstand or playarea- I think they will hold up well- but if its an all day sort of thing- LOTS of toys will make them last a lot longer.
Oh and also consider using the hooks that go into the walls (ceiling)- with my large cockatoos and the heavy toys- I had pary of the net fall once.

Can you use a smaller cast net? This seems like it might be a good solution for me. I have been wanting to build my tiel and parakeet a playground but wasn't sure how to go about it. This might be a good idea!

Personally, I purchased cotton rope from Grey Feather and wove my own rope/net playgym for the birds. I made it so it would hang between two cages.

I split the rope to weave the cross pieces through and tied each off. The birds love it, that is after they got used to the swinging motion under their feet!