Abstract
Parrots are considered the third most popular pet species, after dogs and cats, in the United States of America. Popular birds include budgerigars, lovebirds and cockatiels and are known for their plumage and vocal learning abilities. Plumage colour variation remains the main driving force behind breeder selection. Despite the birds’ popularity, only two molecular genetic tests—bird sexing and pathogen screening—are commercially available to breeders. For a limited number of species, parentage verification tests are available, but are mainly used in conservation and not for breeding purposes. No plumage colour genotyping test is available for any of the species. Due to the fact that there isn’t any commercial plumage genotype screening or parentage verification tests available, breeders mate close relatives to ensure recessive colour alleles are passed to the next generation. This, in turn, leads to inbreeding depression and decreased fertility, lower hatchability and smaller clutch sizes, all important traits in commercial breeding systems. This review highlights the research carried out in the field of pet parrot genomics and points out the areas where future research can make a vital contribution to understanding how parrot breeding can be improved to breed healthy, genetically diverse birds.
Highlights
There are 356 extant psittaciform, or parrot, species natively found mainly around the tropical and sub-tropical areas of South-America, Africa, Asia and Australasia [1]
With the exception of Agapornis roseicollis, Melopsittacus undulatus and Nymphicus hollandicus all species in the psittaciform group are protected by the Convention of International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) [3,4]
Due to strict legislation, pet parrots are legally sold in four ways: (1) they are lovebirds, budgerigars and/or cockatiels, which are not protected under CITES; (2) they were imported from wild-caught parents prior to legislation being passed; (3) they are imported with special permits; or (4) they are born and raised in captivity
Summary
There are 356 extant psittaciform, or parrot, species natively found mainly around the tropical and sub-tropical areas of South-America, Africa, Asia and Australasia [1]. With millions of birds kept as pets across the globe, all species of parrot (with the exception of lovebirds, budgerigars and cockatiels) cannot be continually viewed as “exotic pets”, and there has to be a shift towards breeding birds with the focus on genetic health and biodiversity. This has been successfully achieved in other pet breeding systems (e.g., dogs and cats) where the development of molecular genetic tools improved breeding systems (see paragraph for examples where tests were developed and applied). This review will focus on parrots as pets and not conservation of wild species
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