Picky Picky Bird...

[britmon]

Hello all! I rescued an African Grey about a week ago and I am learning that she is a ridiculously picky eater! Which is quite common for rescues of course. She eats seeds and pellets (specifically the purple ones lol) which is okay but she is underweight from her last home. She gets a fresh fruit/veggie/quinoa mix for breakfast and dinner but she refuses to eat much more than the quinoa. So far she'll eat: chicken, pomegranate, cheerios, quinoa and the occasional black bean. Any tips for getting some more nutritional foods in her? She needs to gain weight but I want to make sure it is done right. I will probably make some birdie bread and sneak a bunch of veggies in that....

Also, she will be transitioning to a more healthy pellet mix than the colorful stuff from the rescue juuuust in case anyone was worried about that

[Wolf]

I am really not a big fan of pellets but that is not important at this point. I would get some whole grains and cook them al dente for your bird and add in some cooked white beans about 25% , and sprinkle a few seeds from a good quality seed mix on top of that. You can start adding in veggies when she starts eating the whole grains. You could also try some wild or brown rice for her to help pick up her weight.
Greys are perhaps the most difficult of birds to get to eat a good healthy diet and so you will have to be persistent as well as patient and creative in order to accomplish this task. What ever they will not eat when prepared in one way they may well eat when it is offered in another form. If you try cut in small pieces try shredded next time or if you tried cooked , try raw and so on. Also after you have gone through and exhausted the different ways that you can think of start all over again. What they won't eat one time later after refusing other ways they may just eat after the second or even the fifth attempt. Try to notice the size, shape, texture and basic flavor of the items that she does eat and copy them. Some like crunchy or crisp foods better or items with a stronger or milder flavor more than others. Also stay away from meats or eggs as your bird needs to eat a low fat and low protein diet.

[britmon]

Thank you so much for your tips! I'm definitely not a fan of pellets either (especially not strictly pelleted diets and the brand that rhymes with Marrisons ). For dinner, I tried warming her food and sprinkling some seeds on top. We will see how it goes....

[Wolf]

Birds do have a tendency to like warm food and it does help, but you are still dealing with a Grey, so don't expect too much too soon. I have been working on my Grey lady's diet for several month at this time and while it is improving it is still slow going. Probably the single thing that carries the greatest impact with her is watching me eat something first.

[britmon]

Warming it up DEFINITELY helped! And she loves sweet potatoes apparently. Baby steps are all I can ask for especially from a Grey. 20 years of a poor diet mixed with grey pickiness seems to be a horrible combination haha. I will try whole grains tomorrow and try cooking and mushing up some veggies to make them potato-like.

[Wolf]

Try the veggies in small pieces first, not only will it possibly save you additional work, many birds prefer the texture of their food as well as the act of picking it up and holding it which is very hard to do with mashed foods.

[liz]

Oh, 20 years old. Good luck with that diet.

I feed mine veggies, grain, cereal, pasta (with or without the tomato gravy), walnuts and almonds.
They love to break into almond shells. Myrtle came to me living her first year of life with only seed. Rambo taught her some foods but she has learn to try anything I give her from my dish and eat in front of her. Recently I had to teach her the word "mine" to keep her out of my plate and away from things she should not eat.

A 20 year old rescue has a lot of baggage. Do you know anything about her backround? Did she come from a loving home that had to give her up or was she rescued from a bad place? Whatever you can learn will help.

Thank you for her rescue. It will be hard but very rewarding to teach the little orphan love as well as diet.

Make sure she knows you respect her as well as love her.

Myrtle spent her first year in a little cage only big enough for one budgie. The first thing I did when I got her home was to open the door. 3 years in and the door has never been closed. Giving her freedom started our bonding. (I have a different way of caring for my birds than others.)

[britmon]

Changing the size of her pieces this morning REALLY made a difference! I cut a couple of pieces of apple into teeny tiny pieces this morning and she chowed down! She is also being quite a chatterbox, I think she is happy I cracked the tiny-piece code. I tried giving her an almond in a shell and she had no idea what to do with it so she threw it as hard as she could haha

She has a whhhoooolllle lot of baggage the poor miss. She is unhandleable but gets freedom on top of her cage whenever we are home.

[liz]

Crack an almond but leave it exposed in the shell. It makes for good enrichment. I did forget to say that the birds eat the almonds and throw the shells at the dogs as they go by.

[Wolf]

Try cracking the almond and removing a portion of the shell leaving the nut in the rest of the shell for her to dig out.
As for her being unhandleable you just need to give it some time and as long as you don't push it she will come around. She needs time to understand that you can be trusted and then to decide to trust you, she is not going to just trust you. Also it would be good to bear in mind that Greys are not generally real cuddly type birds and don't really like to much touching and then only on their terms. The more time that you can devote to just hanging out nearby and talking and singing to her the better. Most parrots love music and singing and they are not overly critical over how well you sing as long as you will sing to/ and with them.