I'm worried now

[Saber]

I am embarrassed to even admit to this as I should have known better and should have sought other opinions...
I have a 10 year old congo african grey that I've had since he was a couple months old (I'd have to dig out my vet paperwork and what-not to get the exact time frame). When I first got him the breeder had claimed he was done with the weaning process (which I expect wasn't entirely true) and had him flown up to me in Minnesota. It was either this or they were going to have him killed so I paid what they wanted to get him to me. They had sent along some of the fruity zupreem pellets and that was it. They said that was all he was eating and that would be ok. I had to hand feed him some weaning formula (I can't even remember what it was at this point) until he would eat those pellets again. Once he did I took him to an avian vet to have his first check up. That vet said he recommended Harrisons High Potency Coarse year round. I looked it up on the website and Harrisons also said the same thing, that for greys as well as a handful of other birds, should be kept on that year round and it was a complete diet. Even so I supplemented with fruits and veggies and some seeds, birdy bread, pasta, and some beans - but the majority of his diet was the pellets...probably 75% That's how it has been for 10 years now

This is where I'm ashamed to say I've never thought about changing his diet. I was told that because the high potency was all he needed it didn't occur to me to second guess it when he seems to be in perfect health. I work at a vet clinic and we review/alter/modify our patients diets all the time as they get older, as new and better food comes out, and as we understand more about the ingredients and requirements of our animals. So why didn't I do this for mine? I truly feel horrible as I type this but it's not about it, its about Scooty and what is best for him...my embarassment aside.

I was hoping I could get some honest opinions from those of you that have had your greys or other parrots for a while now. Should I be reducing his pellets then? I searched these forums and see that many times pellets would make up about 25% and seeds 25% and the rest with fruits/veggies/grains/and the sort if I remember correctly.

I know that every company wants to sell thier own product and to take what they say with a grain of salt but the vet in Minnesota also said the same thing (Como Park Animal Hospital). I have since moved to Wichita, Kansas (which I hate - its too dang hot here).

So all that background being said, and assuming most, if not all, will tell me to cut back his pellets, how should I go about doing that? Rather, I am familier with the transitioning process but what would be the priority to start mixing in first? Ugh...I hope you guys can give me some insight here. I trust those of you with the experience here over what these outdated books and website are saying.

Thank you so much
Becca

[Wolf]

Just to begin with Dr. Harrison no longer recommends the high potency food for long term use with any bird and recommends, instead, that you feed the Adult lifetime maintenance formula. That being said, I would like to give you my take on this subject and then suggest that you decide for yourself as to what you think that you should do.
I have a strong tendency to listen to what my vet says concerning nutrition, but then to take it with a couple of grains of salt. I have several reasons for this, but the two that are most important are that the vets get a kickback from pushing certain feeds from the manufacturer and that the vets spend very little time studying nutrition for any animal and even less on the dietary requirements of any avian species.
Now, to be honest I am not a big fan of pellets for my birds as I find that they are far too dry for an animal that normally eats food with a high moisture content and then drinks water in limited amounts and parrots are one such set of species that fit this profile to a tee. I also do not care for all of the sugars and added chemicals in such highly processed diets. Although I do not care for these products I find that The World Parrot Trust does recommend pellets as a part of a parrots diet but they never recommend that pellets comprise more than 30% of a birds diet.
With all of this I feed my birds a diet of cooked whole grains, cooked vegetables and cooked white beans and lentils ( we call it gloop) along with some fresh raw fruit and vegetables for their breakfast as well as for all day foraging and then a measured amount of seeds for their dinner which I remove from the cage after the bird goes to sleep.
I find that the biggest problem with a diet of pellets is the same as with a diet of seeds and that is that both tend to be too high in fats and proteins, which leads to liver disease. Well this is basically my take on this topic and what I do about it.

[Saber]

Thank you so much for you're thoughts on this. I must be misunderstanding the Harrison's website in regards to what they are recommend for feeding. When I click on the bag for high potency coarse it lists greys in there for year round but does not mention them at all in the lifetime line of foods. I'll get a small bag of the lifetime and start transitioning him over to that if that is what we find to be better for them. I'll search the various threads to see how you guys mix up that gloop

[Pajarita]

I went to Harrison's and checked to see what it says now about High Potency and you are right, it now says that it can be fed all year round to grays, cockatoos, conures and even eclectus! It did not before. It used to say that it should only be used for breeding, sick, weak birds or for birds that had had a real bad diet for a long time and then switch over to Lifetime. I tell you one thing, if you feed High Potency to an ekkie, you will end up with a toe tapping, wing flicking bird in no time at all!

Personally, I don't like any pellets. They are too dry, too processed, and have no (zero, zilch, nada) phytonutrients and, to make matters worse, you don't really know what the heck you are feeding because the nutritional label never have a single value or even a range, everything is lower than or higher than so, for all you know, you could be feeding 30% protein and not know it.

Grays are hard to switch. Much harder than amazons, conures, etc but it can be done. Mine eat gloop and raw produce for breakfast and a small amount of seeds for dinner and they do great on this! Perfect liver and kidney values every time!

[Wolf]

That is a major change because it never said this before it always recommended the lifetime over the high potency formula except for sick or to bring birds up to condition that had eaten a poor diet for a long time.