My budgie saphy

[seagoatdeb]

I make a gloop for my Redbelly fresh each day, and just my personal preference but I dont use microwaves for myself or my birds. In the wild, Redbellys eat acacia berries and they are a legume, assorted greens, nuts, and a few seeds. So I make my mix based on her natural diet. I always have at least one raw legumes green beans, or peas and cooked legumes, lenitils and beans. I always have raw greens, spinach, kale , broccoli etc. I always have carrot or cooked sweet potatoe in it, I allways have some grains in it, and I hand feed pieces of raw sprouted nuts for treats during the day. They also get the occasional raw nut in a shell since they love them so much. They also get some seeds and servings of fresh fruit later in the day. It works for my redbelly the best but have been waiting to find out My Meyers species to get more of an idea of what he ate in the wild.

[Wolf]

I have a pdf on the feeding habits of the Meyers parrot that I would like to share with you. Unfortunately I can't post it on the forum or give it to you through the pm function either. If you will pm me with an e mail address I will send it to you. I believe that it is what you are looking for.

[Pajarita]

Please never feed any raw beans. They have a real bad lectin that affects the blood - it is so bad that, in order to get rid of it, you need to cook the beans for 30 minutes at 100 centigrade heat. See this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phytohaemagglutinin

[seagoatdeb]

Wolf, Thank you that would be really cool!!!!! The breeder just told me that his sub species is a saturatus.

And yes you have to be very carefull about beans and cook them well. Green beans are much safer and I was given a variety I grow from a breeder many years ago (and I save seeds), that are low in Phytohaemagglutinin, and are okay feed once a week, but I usually blanch them anyways. To be more clear, it is the beans inside the pod that contain the Phytohaemafflurinin, so any green beans pods that are young and havent grown beans inside yet are fine. I also grow 5 varieties of sweet potatoes and I am busy right now digging them up and putting them in to cure. We had so many heat waves this summer and they did great, so not ony will I have sweet potatoes for me and the birds, I will have to give some away. I am sure everyone knows but I will mention anyway, Rice is no longer safe for your birds due to high arsenic concentrations.

[seagoatdeb]

Way back when I first had parrots, all the sources and vets said to feed them seeds and they died of malnutrition illnesses. now with mostly pelleted diets they are dying of liver, heart etc diseases but living longer than on a straight seed diet. Many vets and sources still recommend pellets but good sources are all agreeing that a diet with lots of fruits, veggies, fresh grains, and legumes are what birds need the most of with some raw nuts and seeds, but sprouted nuts and seeds are even better.

[seagoatdeb]

Wolf, let me know if you got my pm. i am not sure if i did it right and I have not pmd anyone before on here,

[Pajarita]

Yes, arsenic content is a concern in USA grown rice but there are varieties as well as geographical areas where it's not a concern. Rices grown in California, for example, have a much lower content (while Texas-grown has the highest) and so do non-white rices which are much more nutritious than plain brown (like black japonica and red weehani -especially the Lundberg brand which consistently shows the lowest levels in USA). The safest brown rice is the Basmati grown in Indonesia or India.

[seagoatdeb]

i wont eat any rice, none are arsenic free anymore and the fruit juices are bad too, so I sure wont give them to my birds. anything that has rice flour, rice syrup, etc. is usually not even labelled, so no idea where it is from.

[Wolf]

Seems like it won't be much longer before the only healthy foods we have are what we can grow ourselves, provided we can find the heirloom seeds.

[seagoatdeb]

i have heard of cases in the US where they are preventing the sale of non gmo heirloom feritle seeds unless you go through the expense to test the germination rate. So, it may get very hard to get seeds. In Canada its still easy to get heirloom seeds and I am doing the most I can. Seeds usually only keep for 3 years or so, that means you can only save what you can grow. I never plant everything I have either and hold back some seeds. This summer we had so many heat waves that so many plants couldnt take it, but the sweet pottatoes, the peppers and the tomatoes did great. So I couldnt collect as many seeds for some things.