On the weekend of May 3, 2025, Jan Hooimeijer traveled to Virginia (USA) to give a two-day seminar there veterinary students from Virginia-Maryland college of Veterinary Medicine, colleagues and owners of parrots.
A summary of the Sunday morning workshop
is published on the website of The University of Virginia
We received the following review from Noah Goldfarb (veterinary student), who initiated the seminar:
“The Parrot Behavior and Cognition Conference with Dr. Jan Hooimeijer, hosted at the Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine, was an insightful experience. We learned about human behavior determining the behavior of parrots/animals/children, and the need to prevent behavior and welfare problems in parrots/animals/children as owners, veterinarians, and parents.
Dr. Hooimeijer developed definitions of normal-, desired-, undesired- and enforced behavior. Those definitions are, in combination with the definition of displacement behavior formulated by Prof. Niko Tinbergen as founder of ethology, important tools to understand and recognize behavior. The definitions show how to respond to the different behaviors. Besides those definitions, dr. Hooimeijer developed the Dutch 5-step behavioral protocol as a tool to create a relationship with parrots/animals/children based on mutual respect and mutual trust. Important part of this protocol is to acknowledge and reward the intelligence and cognitive capacities of parrots/animals/children. A relationship based on mutual respect and mutual trust can be considered as crucial to ensure the welfare of parrots/animals/children.
I especially enjoyed the live demonstration portion of the presentation. Dr. Hooimeijer was challenged with a neurotic feather picking scarlet macaw and with an African grey having a long history of hating, attacking, and biting men. Having previously met one of the birds used for the demonstrations, it was fascinating to see how Dr. Hooimeijer’s 5-step protocol resulted in a completely different interaction than I had experienced before. Both birds showed to feel completely comfortable, sitting on his hand and lap without any intention to bite or to show fear.
Toweling was accepted without stress. It was amazing to experience that the parrots did understand the concepts within second/minutes. At the same time, we as students were still struggling with understanding what we had learned after listening a whole day to the different lectures by dr. Hooimeijer. I’m eager to begin employing Dr. Hooimeijer’s approach and techniques as I prepare to start my clinical year and begin seeing these birds in practice.” The knowledge and experience shared by dr. Hooimeijer seems to be crucial for being a veterinarian. Unfortunately this information is not part of our curriculum. I recommend other veterinary study groups to invite dr. Hooimeijer and organize this insightful event to learn about dealing with our own behavior when we are dealing the behavior, intelligence and cognitive abilities of parrots/animals to ensure the welfare of animals.
Best regards,
- Noah Goldfarb -
DVM Candidate Class of 2026
Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine
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