How do you bath a bird?

I just came cross these products called bird bath spray, which is a chemical used to clean the birds. That reminded me when I had a few birds almost two decades ago, they never ever took a single bath or shower for years. I never cleaned them. They seemed to be able to clean their own feather every day with their mouths.
Years ago someone told me his bird would take a bath on his own if he put a bowl of water in the cage.

I believe some birds in the wild can't take bath in natural body of water such as a river or a lake, because they can't swim. It is also hard to imagine how they would want to get wet. I heard birds have body temperature of over 50% higher than humans. Being wet can be very energy consuming for them if they don't freeze to death.


Do birds require to take bath at all?
How do you bath them? Or clean them?

I have some friends who keep singing birds, the kind that they take to bird-singing contests. I do see them giving their birds a bath.

This is how they do it. They would fill a spray bottle with clean water. Then they spray the bird with water from the bottle. Usually they do this when the day is hot and there is sunshine. They would hang the bird cage somewhere where it can catch the sunshine and the bird inside can get dry easily. I think they do this once a week.

Have two cockatiels that I would lightly spritz with water from a spray bottle. Now I wouldn't get them soaked, just enough to get water to bead up on them. They would try to drink from the nozzle and generally would love to be sprayed. Would do this outside in the sun or near the window if it was to windy outside for them.

I used to let my Quaker bathe herself in a big rectangular tupperware container filled with warmish water. She loved it. The Eclectus took showers with a shower perch we bought at a bird store. Now we buy the aloe vera Bird Bath spray and spray them both down daily. It's less hassle than bothering with the tupperware container or getting the shower ready for the Eclectus, then carrying it back to its cage, dripping water all over our wood floors!

When we had little budgies when we were first married, I remember getting them a plastic roundish tube-like thing that attached to the door of their cage for bathing. They loved getting inside & splashing about. I do believe birds need to be bathed for optimum feather health.

I think bathing the birds must have something to do with their health. I have seen people who rear fighting cocks wipe down their birds with a damp cloth everyday. They told me that it made the bird feel refreshed. Quite an odd thing actually because whenever I see a bird that had been caught in the rain, it never looked happy to me.

Most birds do take baths. I see the wild birds splashing around in puddles all the time. At the wildlife rehab where I volunteer, we give the birds shallow bowls of water for baths. I spray my cockatiel with a mist bottle every other day to help keep feather dust under control. If I miss a few days in a row, he sneezes from the extra feather dust. I'd never use the chemicals, though! Birds don't need that stuff. Aloe is okay on occasion, but that's about it.

I have two budgies that hate bathing! I was told that the best way to do it was to fill a container in which they fit comfortable about 1/3 with water and let them just splash around in it - this would have been good advice if my birds had any interest in bathing. Since they don't know, I bought a spray. It's supposed to be used in lie of a bath and it's supposed to help with their feathers. I don't think it's necessary for a bird to bathe, but it's still a good thing

I see birds playing and drinking from puddles all the time in the wild. The bird that I had was a wild bird that I had since it was a baby at my elementary school. One of my classmates found it and it was too small to fly so they put it up in a tree. Later I found it and brought it home. To give our bird a bath, we would get a big bowl and fill it half way with water and put it on our kitchen floor since it is tiled. Then our bird would get excited and hop on the ledge of the bowl while chirping. It would then flutter in and out of the water and back on the ledge until it was brave enough. Then once inside the bowl and in the water it would duck it's head under the water and shake like a dog and all the water would splash everywhere. Our bird seemed to enjoy itself while taking baths. When it was done it would simply hop out and fly away. We never used a spray and our bird never seemed to get cold.