The Green Cheek Conure is the bird a lot of people arrive at after being told that a Sun Conure would be too loud. It is small, clownish, deeply affectionate, and quiet enough to keep in a flat without falling out with the neighbours. For a first parrot that is genuinely a parrot rather than a budgie, it is hard to beat.
What they are like
Green Cheeks are busy, upside-down, pocket-sized birds that want to be involved in whatever you are doing. They burrow into jumpers, lie on their backs in a hand, and will spend an evening hanging off a sleeve. They are more independent than a cockatoo and less needy than a Sun Conure, but they are still a flock bird: one kept alone with nobody home all day will not thrive.
The noise
This is the species' main advantage and it is a real one. A Green Cheek has a chattering, chirring voice and a short alarm call, and while it can shriek when it wants to, it does not have the carrying screech that gets Sun Conures rehomed. Most owners describe the volume as similar to a budgie with occasional bursts. They are not silent - no parrot is - but they are among the few parrots that genuinely suit a terrace or a flat.
The beak
This is the part worth being blunt about, because it catches people out. Green Cheeks are beaky birds. Young ones go through a stage, usually somewhere between four months and a year, where they test everything with the beak and will nip hard enough to break skin. It is normal, it passes with consistent handling, and it is also the single most common reason a young Green Cheek is sold on at six months by somebody who thought they had bought a cuddly bird and got a small set of pliers instead.
If you are buying for a young child, know this in advance. The bird that nips at eight months is usually delightful at two years, but somebody has to get it there.
Colour
Green Cheeks come in a long list of colour mutations - yellow-sided, pineapple, turquoise, cinnamon, and combinations of those. These are colour variations of the same bird, not different species and not different temperaments. A pineapple is not a friendlier bird than a normal green one. Rarer mutations cost more because they are harder to breed, and that is the whole of the difference.
Talking
Some Green Cheeks learn a few words, in a small gravelly voice that takes a familiar ear to understand. Many never say anything. If talking is why you want a parrot, this is not the species - buy one for the company and treat any words as a bonus.
Living with one
Expect twenty to thirty years. They need a cage wider than it is tall, several hours a day out of it, a diet built on pellets with fresh vegetables and limited fruit, and a steady supply of things to shred. Green Cheeks are chewers, and one that runs out of toys will start on the furniture, the window frames, or your paperwork.
Buying one
Because they are bred in such numbers, the quality of what is on offer varies more than with a rarer species. Ask at what age the bird was weaned and whether it was weaned onto food it is still eating. Ask to see it handled by the person selling it. A bird that steps up calmly for a stranger has been handled properly; one that will only sit on its breeder has not been handled by anyone else, which is a different thing to be told before you buy rather than after.
The breeders listed on this page raise Green Cheek Conures and can be contacted directly through the site. Their prices, and what the species has sold for over the years, are shown above.