Even if a store have no birds, other people going to the store have birds and they will have been handling the toys.
A lot of warehouses have mice and rats. Its worth shining a black light if only for curiosity to see if any urine is present on containers and packaging.
I wash everything with F10sc. Radiators at home often have toys drying on them.
I wash mine in baby sterilizer then boil them.
I have my dishwasher on high temp water and use the heat drier when cleaning toys and accessories. Nothing new is given until they get this treatment. I collect wooden spoons and stuff from yard sales and discount stores and run them through the washer for them to have chew toys. It does not keep them from chewing my house but it does slow them down.
booster wrote: I'm probably a little over-cautious in this regard, but it seems like petstores are hazardous places with all of the people AND animal traffic that go through them. Does anyone else advocate washing new parrot toys before letting birds play with them? I'm sincerely afraid my birds will catch some sickness from unwashed toys (or anything new in their cage, for that matter).
IMO, you are doing just the right thing! A bit of disinfection is certainly no harm, as long as it's reasonable! Your birds already catch those small bacteria that are on us people, on the items all over our household, so have no worries for the immunity! After all, the first thing we do when we return home is wash our hands, right?
I mostly make my toys or buy from my friends parrot shop. Hpw do u sanitize wood?
Chlorhexidine 2% disinfection solution (Novalsan) works wonders at killing target bacteria and viruses. I found a local bird store that does not actually sell birds, only supplies - I dont have to worry about dander on any of the new stuff I buy from them.