New to the forum and need advice

[Aly29]

Hi everyone, I'm new and wanted to introduce myself. I have a sun conure named Mango who I've had for 6 years. He's very sweet and loves following me around the house. When he sees me leaving the room he'll fly onto my shoulder and come with me. We've bought him some pellets but he doesn't seem to like them much. He's used to eating seeds so it's hard to get him to eat the pellets. I mix them in with the seeds but he'll just toss the pellets out of the way and eat the seeds. How can I get Mango to atleast try the pellets?

[Wolf]

Hi and welcome to the forum.

How long have you and Mango been together? Do you know how old he is? Does he eat any foods other than seeds?

I do not feed my birds pellets, they eat fresh produce, gloop ( a home made food consisting of whole grains, vegetables and white beans and lentils), for breakfast and all day, and a seed mix or a seed and nut mix for dinner.

As a general rule most parrots will eats seeds, if given a choice of seeds or pellets. The only way, that I know, to get them to try pellets is to either give them straight pellets and allow hunger to get them to try them or to mix them together with perhaps only half of their normal ration of seeds. They will eat the seeds first and then as they get hungry they will begin to try the pellets.

[liz]

Welcome to the forum.

I have a flock of Cockatiels who came to me as rescues or rehomes before they turn into rescues. Some came to me only eating pellets and some only ate seeds. I don't like pellets because you can't adjust what is in them. With seed I can remove the things I don't want them to have or add a little more of something they should have. I have no history on most of them but they usually come with all their belongings and food All of my birdies have adjusted to the vegie and fruit diet. I also give them grain that has been softened in boiling water. That is all they get for breakfast and pick at it the rest of the day. The Amazons get a piece of walnut added to their breakfast. Seeds are their preferred food so I give seed for supper just before their sundown time. I use seed to make sure they all have full bellies for the night.

I share my foods with the birds such as cooked oat meal before I add milk and sugar. The Amazons are in the middle of the house and eat the hand out foods at the same time I am eating. They tell me which foods they want from my meal and just separate some for them before I add such things as butter or salt. This gives them more variety of foods and allows for them to eat with their flock of humans. Whatever the Amazons beg for I also give to the Cockatiels. We humans have cut down on eating bread because they beg for it and it is really not very good for them. Not enough nutrition in it and it takes up belly space that should be used for vegies.

I know it is a long post but I hope you get something from it. I don't research since I really don't have the time. Instead I absorb from Wolf, Pajarita and some of the others. I knew nothing about birds when I started getting them. All the knowledge I have is from raising my human kids. This forum has helped me



I overfeed and have some waste but would rather have waste and know they are full than for all the food to be eaten and wonder if my handicapped birds were able to eat enough. With so many Cockatiels I feed them on a large tray on the floor. They eat their favorites first then go for the ones they need. I do not use bowls since the time I saw my Amazon, Rambo, using his beak to brush the shells off the top to reach the food. To prevent this plates and trays are more practical than bowls.

With so many cockatiels I can't see who is eating what. That is the only problem with my method but it works for them. My handicaps have all joined in the flock and eat with them. The others seem to know that they are handicapped and make room for them.

[liz]

The above post has all that I wanted to tell you. Being technology impaired, my computer sometimes rearranges it as it goes into post.

[Pajarita]

Welcome to the forum! I also have a sun conure, she is a ten year old female who had gotten a bad diet all of her previous life so she is still learning to eat new things and it is HARD. The key is persistence. Unfortunately, in this case, persistence also means A LOT of waste because you will end up throwing away a lot of food but there is no other way.

As to pellets and seeds, Wolf is correct, no bird will choose pellets over seeds so transitioning them is a long and difficult process. I don't feed pellets. I've done research on parrots natural diets for many years and have reached the conclusion that pellets are not the best dietary option (I can tell you exactly what I found out if you wish). I feed gloop with raw produce in the morning and a good quality seed/nut mix for dinner. My Sunny has a bit of hemochromatosis because she was fed cheerios for a couple of years so I make sure all her food is as low in iron as I can make it but, thankfully, she took to the gloop almost immediately (I only had trouble transitioning one single bird and all it took was for her to be let out of the cage, once I did that, she was eating it in 24 hours).

[seagoatdeb]

Well some pellets are better than an all seed diet. You could try avicakes as a transition, it has worked well for many trying to get their parrrots on to pellets. The more raw fruits and vegetables you can get your cockatiel to eat, the better though.

[Wolf]

Nutritionally speaking most pellets may be better for the bird than a seed mix due to everything being all ground up so that the bird can not pick and choose what it likes the best. They also add vitamins and minerals, although they are the artificial forms which do not digest as well.

In my opinion the thing that makes pellets not so good are the use of soy and soy products, sugars, dyes and the various other chemical preservatives, many of which are known to cause health issues in humans and the soy is about to be banned in Australia due to reproductive issues in birds. Also the dryness of pellets causes me some concern. These are things that concern me, but the bird does not care about these things.

[Aly29]

Hello everyone, thank you for your helpful replies.
I've had Mango since he was 3-4 months old and he is now 6 years old. I give him fruits and veggies every morning. He doesn't like veggies that much, he will just lick them or try a small piece and drop it. He really loves apples, green grapes and carrots.
Wolf and Pajarita, which seed mix do you give to your birds? The one that Mango gets is Higgins Safflower Gold. The pellets and the seed mix were recommended to us from the place we got Mango, "For Birds Only" in New York. All of their birds are fed pellets.
Also, I noticed yesterday that Mango has slowly started to eat the pellets. He will eat almost all of the seed mix first and then eat the pellets.
I have never tried feeding gloop but I've been reading some recipes online so I will definitely try it.

[Wolf]

It is not a surprise that Mango prefers fruits to vegetables as in their natural environment they would naturally eat much more fruit than vegetables. The only problem is that even when we have a basic understanding of their natural diet there is no way that we can duplicate it. This only means that it will take more time to get him to eat the vegetables that he needs for a more complete diet. The more and greater variety of raw natural foods that we can get them to eat the better of they will be nutritionally speaking. The best way to get them to eat the raw produce that we want them to eat is to share this food with them. This very often means that we may end up eating some raw green beans or other vegetables for breakfast so that we can share it with them. One of the benefits of doing this is that it is not only a social event for a parrot it is also a bonding activity as well.

The Higgins Safflower gold is one of the better seed mixes although since I do not use it I am not very sure about the dehydrated fruits in it. If the dried fruit looks appetizing to you to eat then they are likely not the best option for your Mango bird. I really don't have a particular brand of seed mix at this time, I keep reading the ingredient list of the different seed mixes and pick out the ones that have the most variety of seeds without anything else added and then I try that mix for a while.

[Pajarita]

My sun conure is now getting ABBA 1600-C, a cockatiel mix to which I add a nut or two (depends on which kind) chopped into little pieces because she had not gotten enough protein in her previous life. Protein intake is a very difficult problem because too much is bad but too little is bad, too! So, right now, she is still on a higher protein than she would normally get so as to 'balance out' her previous lack. She is molting now which is perfectly normal as this is the season for it BUT it's the second time in less than a year as she first molted a few weeks after she came to live with me (it was the finally getting enough protein that did it) so she will continue on the higher protein for a bit longer than she would have if she had been with me for a longer time.

If you look at the ingredients ((http://www.abbaseed.com/Seed_Products/1600C/1600c.html) you will see stuff there that I would not normally feed a bird (the 'kibble' part of it) but the birds don't touch it, they just eat the seeds and nuts. By the way, this is the seed mix I use for the larger species with lots and lots of roasted nuts added to it (I buy this: http://www.abbaseed.com/Seed_Products/2 ... /2400.html, roast them in my oven and add them to the seed mix). For a sun conure, I would use this food for breeding and molting and this other one for the resting season (I feed them less protein during the winter): http://www.abbaseed.com/Seed_Products/1600/1600.html