Golden'obles vs Harrisons

[Grey_Moon]

So, the china prairie and phoenix foraging rolls are out of the question this month (birdie vet bills bcuz giardia is back---so I don't have 100 to fork out to get the starter kit for the china prairie) and payday is Monday so I'm debating what pelleted diet to try.

I'm debating trying the Golden'obles by Goldenfeast. They're about the same price as the high-potency.

Anyone tried them? What do you think vs. the harrisons high-potency?

[lzver]

I've never even heard of Golden'obles before. I did a quick google and it looks to be an organic food.

I would say that Harrison's is the superior organic parrot pellet food but I don't feed it to my birds. My birds completely ignore the fine size and the coarse is just too large for them ... its a lot to spend for them to take one bite out of a large coarse piece and then have them drop it. If they started making a medium sized pellet then I would more seriously consider feeding.

[pchela]

Try roudybush pellets. Not as expensive and a good quality pellet. Golden obles are by golden feast which is also a good brand. Golden obles smell sweeter than the others and look like cheerios. Any of the three should be a good choice. Just compare ingredients.

[Mr.Darcy]

I've never even heard of Golden'obles before. I did a quick google and it looks to be an organic food.

I would say that Harrison's is the superior organic parrot pellet food but I don't feed it to my birds. My birds completely ignore the fine size and the coarse is just too large for them ... its a lot to spend for them to take one bite out of a large coarse piece and then have them drop it. If they started making a medium sized pellet then I would more seriously consider feeding.

I agree with Izver about needing a medium size pellet, however I do use the harrison's High potency for my baby Hahn's and I must say, when he came from the breeder I was disappointed to see a lot of stress bars in his feathers. He is now starting to molt, new tail feathers and wing feathers and the new feathers are AWESOME looking. Really bright green and smooth no bars. I feed him pasta with mixed veggies, some fruit,and the Harrison's fine pellets plus a bowl of dry pellets(6 only) with Kashi Go lean cereal. I have been using Abba Green 92 mash for his breakie too. And for a foraging treat a small spoon full of Abba seeds.

Hope this is helpful...

[Grey_Moon]

Agreed---the high-potency delivers some awesome results.
However, I was still seeing peeling beaks with it and so needed to add the palm oil.

The golden'obles have double the ingredients and about the same protein/fat ratio.


Side note---for me to feed Jacko as much Harrison's as he wants its about 5 pounds a month which runs me $40 CDN a month, plus about 15 for Sully.
However, this looks to be mostly because the cubes are huge and the bags arent packed all that much. Whereas the golden'obles look to be more expensive up front (17 for a pound) but you get a 1 pound container of cheerio sized pellets. It looks like I might get more food per pound with it--so it might last longer than the 5 pound harrisons--therefore being more economical and healthier.

Anyone have any experience with it?

[pfinarffle]

We've tried all of these for our yeast-prone Sennie.

Our bird didn't touch Roudybush.

Our bird tolerates Harrison's. We had him on the course size for a while, but I noticed he was picking the corn pieces out of them! So we switched over to the high potency fine. He seems to eat those just fine. If you look at the ingredients, Harrison's seems to be about the same as Roudybush, ie corn-based, but it has better vegetable-based ingredients (barley, chia seeds, alfalfa, lentils etc) whereas beyond corn, wheat and peanut Roudybush is just vitamins (and it smells as such!). As corn is not my fave source of protein I also give our guy Golden'obles.

He doesn't seem to like either pellet that much compared to seed, but he'll go and nibble when he's hungry enough. I also like that the Golden'obles aren't as corn-based, they are organic, and they also contain probiotics, which help him avoid another yeast infection.

I say go with whatever your bird likes and that you can afford. But, as with all human food, read the ingredients so you know exactly what you're feeding.


*Edit: PS: I just noticed some other folks having a lot of expense in pellet costs for Harrison's. I thought our bird was going through pounds of it each month as well, until I realized he was just eating the tiny bits of corn in the pellets! Now that he's on a smaller pellet size, he's definitely eating the pellets entirely and a 5 lb bag lasts us months!

[HungryBird]

I feed Golden'obles, Harrison's, and Totally Organic Pellets. When it comes to Harrison's my parakeets will only eat Adult Lifetime Fine and my cockatiels eat both Adult Lifetime Fine and Pepper Coarse. They love Golden'obles strung up on leather rope.

All three of those pellets have very different ingredient lists but they all look good to me.

[rednerite]

I'm late to this and new to this board but: I feed my handicap Blue Crown Conure Golden'obles. I tried every other pellet out there for 5 months with every trick and method of converting him from 20 years of a seed diet to pellet formula with no luck.

He hated roudybush, zupreem (both fruity flavored and unflavored), harrisons, etc. I finally discovered Golden'obles and tried them because they were in the shape of cheerios which he loves as a treat. He took to them immediately; they smell great, sort of like molasses. He has had serious improvement in his overall condition (I'm sure mostly because he's on a pellet diet period rather than golden'obles per se), but I am a huge fan of them since he was such a finicky bird rescued from 20 years of neglect.

His beak has regrown all new, hard layers whereas before it was crumbling in the vet's hands when needing to be filed or trimmed, and his feather condition has improved dramatically and the coloration is unbelievable. So yes; I would highly recommend trying the Golden'obles for the picky bird that you can't convert to Harrison's or other pellet diet. I also like the ingredient list and that it is similar to the high potency, which really was what Charlie needed considering his overall health condition.

[dawnat]

My husband and I came across Golden'obles in a local pet store about 2 years ago and they were recommended to us. My Amazon loves them. She had been eating Harrisons and Zoopreme. I had tried many other pellets including Rowdybush and Lafebers, but she wouldn't eat them. Harrisons she ate, but not well. She liked zoopreme. Our vet wasn't familiar with Golden'obles so could not comment. She had been eating Golden'obles for a year when we did her lab work last year and it was great. I got her 18 years ago as a 15 year old rescue. She was on an all seed diet, was obese and high cholesterol. She has her issues but no longer the diet related ones she had when I got her. She was healthy with Harrisons and Zoopreme but much prefers the molasses scented non corn based Golden'obles.

[Pajarita]

Well, it has soy (I don't feed soy to any of my animals, way too iffy), two ingredients which should be organic and are not (apples, carrots) and two different types of sugar sources (have you tasted them, I bet they are sweet) PLUS the nutritional label reads:

1. crude protein (min)17.5% which, for one thing, it could an actual protein content of 25% for all anybody knows but even if it was at 17.5 exactly, it's still way too high for an amazon which requires a diet of 17% protein ONLY when they are breeding (there is a study about this).

2. crude fiber (max) 6% - again, no real value so, in reality and as far as anybody knows it could have only 1% and still tell the truth on the nutritional value labels (this not really knowing what you are feeding them is one of the reasons why I don't like any type of pellet for them). The other problem is that crude fiber is usually all insoluble fiber, which is good because it cleans out the intestines (this is the fiber that gives bulk) but you also need soluble because that's what makes you feel full as it slows down digestion so, if the value was actually 6% it would not be bad (not as good a beans that have 11 to 14%) but they have no soluble fiber and that's not good.

3. moisture 3.5% (max) - and this is terrible! Parrots eat a natural diet of 80% - 95% water content so, obviously, 3.5 max is real bad for them (and this is another of the several reason I don't like pellets).