Taking a Pet Bird from Canada to the UK

Taking a pet bird from Canada to the United Kingdom is far more involved than crossing into the United States. You need an import licence from the Animal and Plant Health Agency (APHA), you can only land at four specific airports, and unless your bird meets one of three pre-export conditions, it faces 30 days of quarantine on arrival.

How this route differs from Canada to the US

If you have read our guide on taking your bird from Canada to the United States, put it out of your mind for this trip. That corridor is the lightest one in this cluster because US federal rules except the personally owned pet bird from an import permit, a health certificate and quarantine. Great Britain works the opposite way. The single sentence on gov.uk that sets the tone for the whole move is this one: “You must have an import licence to bring any pet animal that is not a dog, cat or ferret.” (gov.uk, Bringing pet animals to Great Britain). A parrot, cockatiel or any other pet bird falls squarely into “not a dog, cat or ferret,” so the licence requirement applies before anything else on this page.

The four things that decide whether your UK trip works

An import licence from APHA

APHA does publish a general licence, IMP/GEN/2017/02, but it covers only movements to Northern Ireland, the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man. A bird travelling from Canada to Great Britain (England, Scotland or Wales) needs a specific import licence issued by APHA, applied for in advance of travel. This licence is a separate requirement from the advance notice APHA also needs before your bird arrives, covered below — you need both, not one or the other. Unconfirmed: we could not verify this against an official source — specifically, current APHA processing time for a pet bird import licence, so you can build a realistic margin into your booking — APHA. Please confirm with the relevant agency listed at the bottom of this page before you rely on it for your own bird.

Four airports, no exceptions in the wording — and one open conflict

gov.uk states it plainly: “You can only bring a pet bird to Great Britain if you fly into Edinburgh, Gatwick, Glasgow or Heathrow airport.” (gov.uk, Bringing pet animals to Great Britain). That eliminates most itineraries before you book a flight, in exactly the way the port-of-entry rule does for the US route. There is, however, a wrinkle we could not resolve for you. The export certificate’s own notes for completion contemplate arrival by sea, stating that the certificate’s validity “is prolonged by the time of the sea voyage” — language that only makes sense if a sea crossing is a live possibility. The consumer-facing gov.uk page, by contrast, names only the four airports and says nothing about ports. These two official sources are not obviously reconcilable, and we are not going to guess which one governs your specific route. Confirm directly with APHA before you plan anything other than a flight into one of the four named airports.

Advance notice — and who arranges the check

gov.uk states that APHA must be told at least one day before you travel, and that it is APHA — not you — that arranges the inspection of your bird when it arrives (gov.uk, Bringing pet animals to Great Britain). This is separate from, and in addition to, the import licence above: the licence authorises the movement in principle, while the one-day notice tells APHA exactly when to expect this particular bird.

Identification your bird must carry

The consumer page describes acceptable identification loosely — a closed ring, leg band, microchip, transponder or tag. The certificate’s own notes for the identification box are stricter: they call for an individual number that allows the bird to be traced back to its premises of origin, not just any mark. Confirm with your certifying accredited veterinarian, well before your inspection appointment, that whatever identification your bird carries meets that standard.

Two places we have to tell you something that costs us the sale

We board birds for a living, so both of the following work against our own commercial interest. We are telling you anyway, because getting this wrong can cost you your bird’s export route entirely.

Boarding in the run-up to departure can push you into GB quarantine. Two of the three GB pre-export routes described below depend on your bird having no contact with other birds in the period immediately before it travels — one requires 30 days confined at its premises of origin “without coming into contact with any other bird(s),” and separately, the owner’s own declaration on the certificate states that between the pre-movement veterinary inspection and actual departure the bird “will remain isolated from any possible contact with any other bird(s).” A boarding stay at a facility that houses other birds, taken during that window, is incompatible with both. Get this backwards and you do not simply lose the pre-export route — you land in the 30-day quarantine fallback in Britain instead. We have not asked APHA how it treats a boarding facility specifically in this context, and we are not implying that we have; if your timeline puts boarding anywhere near your isolation window, put the question to APHA directly. Boarding well in advance of that window, while your import licence and paperwork are still being sorted, is a different matter — see our note on long-term boarding during a relocation for how that timing usually works.

Rehoming a bird in the UK cannot use this certificate at all. The whole pet-bird route rests on the movement being “non-commercial” — defined as a movement that does not have as its aim the sale of, or transfer of ownership of, a pet animal — and the owner’s declaration on the certificate states the bird is “not intended to be sold or transferred to another owner.” Sending your bird on to a new keeper in Britain is a transfer of ownership on the face of that definition, so the pet certificate is the wrong instrument for that move. That enquiry belongs on the commercial import route, under its own certificate (GBHC610, for captive-bred birds), which we have not detailed here. Note too that an “authorised person” who can travel with your bird in your place needs your written authorisation — that is a different thing from a new owner. If rehoming rather than travelling with your bird is genuinely the plan, our guide on moving abroad when you can’t take your bird covers boarding and rehoming as separate options.

The export health certificate: GBHC611 “PB: Pet birds”

Almost everything written for owners skips the certificate itself. It is the document your accredited veterinarian and CFIA will actually be working from, and two things in it change how you plan the trip.

Ten days sets your real schedule — not your flight date

The certificate states plainly: “This certificate is valid for 10 days.” That is the tightest window in this entire cluster of border articles, and it is what you build your schedule backwards from, not the date on your plane ticket. The clinical inspection behind the certificate has to happen the same day, within 48 hours, or on the last working day before your bird is dispatched — so your import licence, your identification check and your pre-export condition (below) all need to be settled well before that inspection is booked.

Quarantine is the fallback, not the default

The consumer gov.uk page tells you plainly that rabbits face four months of quarantine and rodents and salamanders face their own isolation periods. It says nothing at all about birds, which reads as though nothing applies to them. That is misleading. The certificate itself shows the real structure: your bird must meet one of three conditions before departure, or else you fall into a fourth option that is far more expensive.

Route	What it requires
1. Supervised confinement	30 days confined at the bird’s premises of origin, under official supervision, with no contact with any other bird — open only to a bird from a “third country listed in accordance with GB requirements” (see below)
2. Vaccination	Vaccination and re-vaccination against avian influenza H5 and H7 within the last 6 months and no later than 60 days before dispatch, using a non-live vaccine approved for the species
3. Isolation and testing	At least 10 days’ isolation before dispatch, plus an H5/H7 antigen or genome test on a sample taken no earlier than the third day of isolation
Fallback: 30-day GB quarantine	If none of the above is met, the owner instead declares arrangements for 30 days’ post-arrival quarantine in an approved GB quarantine facility

An owner who does nothing in advance does not simply fail a requirement — they default into that last row and pay for a month of quarantine after landing. Planning one of the first three routes early is the difference between your bird coming home with you and your bird spending a month in a quarantine facility.

One pre-export route depends on a list we could not confirm covers Canada

Route 1 above, the 30-day supervised confinement option, is open only to a bird from “a third country listed in accordance with GB requirements.” The certificate’s notes define that by pointing to a document about live ungulates and fresh meat of ungulates — an entirely different category of trade — whose linked dataset is titled “EU and EFTA countries approved to export animals and animal products to Great Britain.” Canada is neither an EU nor an EFTA country. Whether it is listed for this specific purpose cannot be answered from the certificate itself, and we are not going to guess. Unconfirmed: we could not verify this against an official source — specifically, whether Canada appears on the GB list of countries approved for the 30-day supervised-confinement route for pet birds — APHA. Please confirm with the relevant agency listed at the bottom of this page before you rely on it for your own bird. The vaccination route (route 2) and the 10-day isolation-and-test route (route 3) carry no equivalent listing condition on their face, so if the confinement route turns out not to be open to Canadian birds, one of the other two is likely your practical path.

The “maximum five pets” rule does not apply to birds

You will see it repeated online that a non-commercial pet movement is capped at five animals. That rule exists, but it applies expressly to “the species listed in Part A” of the relevant annex — and Part A is dogs, cats and ferrets only. Birds sit in Part B, listed as species other than those covered by separate poultry legislation. So the cap of five simply does not apply to a pet bird movement. That is not the same as saying there is no limit at all: the movement still has to be genuinely non-commercial, with the birds accompanying their owner rather than being shipped separately, and anyone moving more than one or two birds should put the actual number to APHA rather than lean on the absence of a stated cap.

After your bird lands: the first 30 days

One condition catches people who assume the paperwork ends at the airport. For 30 days after entry, your bird must go to a household or other residence in Great Britain, and it must not be entered in any show, fair, exhibition or other gathering of birds during that period. The only exception is a move to an approved quarantine facility, if that is the route your bird took.

The Canadian side: your export certificate and accredited vet

Some of what this cluster established for the US route does not carry over here, and it is worth saying why. Section 69(1.1) of the Health of Animals Regulations only ever disapplies part of the certification requirement for exports to the United States, specifically because the US does not request a certificate for a pet bird. The UK does request one — the GBHC611 certificate above — so that carve-out does not apply to this trip, and the full requirement in section 69(1) of the Health of Animals Regulations governs your bird’s export. In practice that means: you provide evidence to a veterinary inspector or accredited veterinarian that your bird meets the UK’s sanitary requirements; that vet issues the certificate (endorsed by a CFIA veterinary inspector, bearing the official export stamp); and you provide whatever information a veterinary inspector requests about how the transport requirements will be met.

Because your bird is flying, Part XII of the Health of Animals Regulations also applies: sections 148.1 and 150(5) make the IATA Live Animals Regulations crate standard a matter of Canadian law for this flight, not just an airline preference. Unconfirmed: we could not verify this against an official source — specifically, which edition of the IATA Live Animals Regulations applies to your travel dates. Please confirm with the Canadian Food Inspection Agency at 1-800-442-2342 before you rely on it for your own bird.

If your plan includes eventually bringing your bird back into Canada, that return trip has its own, separate requirements — our guide to importing a pet bird to Canada covers that side of the corridor.

CITES and the certificate’s WOAH box — left open on purpose

The GBHC611 certificate requires the certifying veterinarian to attest that Canada is a member of the World Organisation for Animal Health (WOAH) and to name Canada’s Regional Commission. That is the certifying vet’s box to complete, not something we are asserting here. Unconfirmed: we could not verify this against an official source — specifically, Canada’s current WOAH membership status and Regional Commission, for the certifying veterinarian’s attestation. Please confirm with the Canadian Food Inspection Agency at 1-800-442-2342 before you rely on it for your own bird.

The certificate also carries a CITES box. If your species is CITES-listed, it will need its own permits on both ends of the trip. The Canadian export side of CITES permitting is covered elsewhere in this cluster and is administered by Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC). We have not verified what a GB CITES import permit requires for a pet bird, and we are not going to describe a process we have not read. Unconfirmed: we could not verify this against an official source — specifically, what a GB CITES import permit requires for your species, and how it interacts with the pet-bird import licence — APHA. Please confirm with Environment and Climate Change Canada at 1-855-869-8670 or cites@ec.gc.ca before you rely on it for your own bird.

Building your timeline backwards from ten days

Because the certificate is only valid for 10 days, the order of operations matters more than the calendar date of your flight. Roughly, in the order things need to happen: apply for your APHA import licence; decide which of the three pre-export routes your bird will use and start it on the right timeline (30 days confined, 6 months to first vaccination plus a booster no later than 60 days out, or a minimum 10-day isolation with testing); arrange identification that meets the certificate’s tracing standard; book your accredited veterinarian for an inspection timed to land within the certificate’s 10-day window and the specific inspection-timing rule above; give APHA the required one day’s notice; and book a flight into Edinburgh, Gatwick, Glasgow or Heathrow — unless you have confirmed a sea route directly with APHA. Any boarding stay you need should be scheduled to finish well clear of whichever isolation period your chosen pre-export route requires.

Frequently asked questions

Do I need a licence to bring my pet bird to Great Britain?

Yes. gov.uk states: “You must have an import licence to bring any pet animal that is not a dog, cat or ferret.” (gov.uk, Bringing pet animals to Great Britain). APHA’s general licence, IMP/GEN/2017/02, only covers movements to Northern Ireland, the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man, so a bird travelling from Canada into Great Britain needs its own specific import licence from APHA.

Which airports can I fly my bird into?

gov.uk states: “You can only bring a pet bird to Great Britain if you fly into Edinburgh, Gatwick, Glasgow or Heathrow airport.” (gov.uk, Bringing pet animals to Great Britain). The export certificate’s own notes separately contemplate arrival by sea, which is not obviously consistent with that airport list. Confirm your intended route with APHA before booking anything other than a flight into one of those four airports.

How much advance notice does APHA need before my bird arrives?

gov.uk states that APHA must be notified at least one day before you travel, and that APHA arranges the inspection of your bird on arrival, not you.

Will my bird have to go into quarantine in the UK?

Only if it does not meet one of three pre-export conditions on the GBHC611 certificate — 30 days’ supervised confinement away from other birds, avian influenza vaccination on the certificate’s timeline, or at least 10 days’ isolation with testing. If none of those is met, the owner instead declares 30 days of quarantine in an approved GB facility after arrival.

Can I bring more than one bird at a time?

The “maximum five pets” rule you may see referenced online applies only to dogs, cats and ferrets, not to birds. That does not mean there is no limit for birds — the movement must still be genuinely non-commercial, with the birds accompanying you as their owner. Confirm the number you plan to bring with APHA.

Can I use this process to rehome my bird with someone in the UK?

No. The pet-bird certificate is built around a non-commercial movement, and the owner must declare the bird is not intended to be sold or transferred to another owner. Rehoming is a transfer of ownership, so it needs the commercial import route and a different certificate, not this one.

Can I board my bird right before flying to the UK?

Be careful with the timing. Two of the three pre-export routes require your bird to have no contact with other birds in the period immediately before departure, so a boarding stay at a facility with other birds, taken during that isolation window, can push you into the 30-day GB quarantine fallback instead. Boarding well before that window, while your licence and paperwork are still being arranged, does not carry the same conflict.

How long is the export certificate valid once it’s issued?

The GBHC611 certificate states it is valid for 10 days, which is the figure your entire schedule — licence, pre-export condition, veterinary inspection and flight — needs to be built around.

If your bird’s pre-export window, licence approval or your own travel dates don’t line up, BST can board your bird in Mississauga for as long as that gap takes to close — get in touch through our booking page for a quote.

Related guides in this series

• Moving Abroad and You Can’t Take Your Bird: Board, Rehome, or Wait
• Importing a Pet Bird to Canada: The Complete CFIA Guide (2026)
• Long-Term Bird Boarding While You Relocate: 30, 60 and 90+ Days
• Taking Your Bird from Canada to the United States: Driving vs Flying
• Bringing a Pet Bird to Canada From Outside the US: Why You Need a Permit
• Can I Fly Inside Canada With My Parrot? Domestic Rules by Carrier

Who to call before you travel

Confirm every requirement below with the agency itself. These are the people who
can actually authorise your bird’s movement — we cannot.

Every number below was checked against the agency’s own website on
27 July 2026. Government phone numbers and web pages still change without notice.
If one does not connect, find the agency through its own official site rather than trusting
what is printed here.

• Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) — import and export of live
  birds, health certificates, permits: 1-800-442-2342 from
  Canada and the US, or 1-613-773-2342 local and
  international, 8 am to 7 pm EST Monday to Friday except holidays. CFIA names
  services related to travelling with pets as something its area offices handle —
  for the GTA that is the Mississauga animal health office,
  289-247-4100, 8 am to 4 pm
  · inspection.canada.ca
• Environment and Climate Change Canada — CITES permitting — export and
  import permits for CITES-listed species, and what documents exist for repeat crossings:
  1-855-869-8670
  · cites@ec.gc.ca
• Canada Border Services Agency — what happens at the border itself,
  declarations and inspection fees: 1-800-461-9999, Monday to
  Friday 8 am to 4 pm local time. Press 0 to reach an agent; CBSA’s published
  service standard is to answer within 20 minutes
• USDA APHIS — the US pet-travel hub, with separate paths for import,
  export and interstate movement, and the list of which birds count as pets at all:
  aphis.usda.gov/pet-travel
• US Fish & Wildlife Service — CITES and Wild Bird Conservation Act
  permits, applied for through the ePermits portal at
  fws.gov/permits. The agency
  contact centre is 1-800-344-9453
  · info@fws.gov
• Animal and Plant Health Agency (APHA) — the Great Britain regulator: pet import licences, advance notification before you travel, and approved quarantine facilities: imports@apha.gov.uk · gov.uk/bringing-pet-animals-to-great-britain

What we can and cannot help with

We cannot help with paperwork. Bird Sitting Toronto is a bird
boarding and care business. We are not a customs broker, an immigration consultant, a
veterinary practice or a legal adviser. We do not file permits, complete applications or
deal with any agency on your behalf, and we cannot guarantee any outcome at any border.
Everything on this page is information only.

There are two things we can do. If your bird cannot travel with you
— because the paperwork is still in progress, the airline will not carry it, or the
timing simply does not work — we can board
your bird in the GTA for as long as you need, including by the month. And if it
becomes clear the bird genuinely cannot come with you, we can help you
rehome it to a good home rather
than leaving you to sort that out alone.

We publish this guide because our boarding clients ask us about it constantly, and
because the answer is genuinely hard to assemble from the primary sources.