I'm sorry Jacko, am I not cleaning fast enough?

[Polarn]

I think flinging food VS eating it tidy is a sideeffect of food management tbh, if the food they get is what they need to fill up they doesnt really want to fling it away or they wont get a full crop... might be their just neat but thats my thoughts on the matter.

[Grey_Moon]

True that, but on a side note I'd have to worry about the impact of restricting food to produce that effect and what it does mentally/emotionally to the bird.

Of course if the bird is absolutely flinging food *EVERYWHERE*, there's a lot of uneaten food in the bowl and there's a right mess then chances are the bird is being offered too much food.
But on the opposite side of the coin, if the bird is making darn sure to eat every crumb and waste *nothing* then to me that would suggest a feeling of impending famine and anxiety. Like the birds are teetering on the edge of not having enough to maintain themselves.

The reason I say this is because I only saw Jacko's behaviour look anything like Kili's and Truman's when I was micromanaging her food intake, restricting availability and had it measured down to the exact morsel of food so that she couldn't afford to waste *anything*.
Which was for me awesome because hey---no birdie mess.

But I noticed she wasn't doing so hot with it and seemed very anxious and was almost obsessive about food---she began getting loud and calling and would even try to eat wood chips that looked like food. Yet she maintained her vet-approved weight.

This sort of food restriction/management is looked down upon when trying wean baby birds precisely because it makes them anxious and can lead into permanent/future developmental issues (there was a case study involving an adult grey who had been weaned/raised like this---he was extremely anxious and self-mutilated, particularly in scenarios which involved food).

Thus, I've stopped food managing. While it is true that I don't believe food should be left out 24/7 or be offered in huge ridiculous quantities the more I understand and experience the more that I feel we should be treading that line between enough to make them feel secure and not enough to foster excessive waste or picky eating.
Truth is birds do eat frequently though not constantly. In the wild there would never be exactly enough fruit to fill them up but no more or less than that.

With that in mind, although Jacko's two main meals are scheduled and offered at breakfast/supper and she does not get access to food after supper until the breakfast the next day, during the day she does have access to a reasonable quality of food that won't spoil.

She gets enough at each meal that there's not tons of uneaten food but if she decides that for whatever reason she doesn't want to eat that third of the blueberry that its ok, that there's a few spare leftover berries in the bowl when she's done and she won't be looking for every scrap of blueberry or egg that got tossed around.

She goes without long enough (after dinner and through till morning) that I can get an accurate weight on her in the morning---which is the main benefit of not having food 24/7 for me.

[Polarn]

Sorry i didnt clearify in my post.. I just simply wanted to provide a reason to why certain birds may not create a mess (and the reasoning is by far what I would call scientific, and there may be plenty of more reasons) But since I know MIchael does manage the food I figured there is good odds that is the reason. I'm however not claiming that birdie mess is a reason to start decreasing the food they get, I do have some birdiemess, even if I do monitor weight and feed thereafter, and if I does feed more I may have more birdie mess, not that its really any noticible difference, but I will notice an increase of weight, especially in the zon. And if i decrease the food given i notice a drop in weight but still have a mess, but continue feeding less the mess would most likely decrease since the birds would probably start taking better care of the food given.

Anyways your original post made me chuckle And now rereading my previouse post it kind of seems abit short (not in amount of text but in terms of thought)

[GreenWing]

This made me LOL. I can visualize Jacko laughing and walking away, too. Hilarious.