Pasta sauce as a last resort?

[Khaiqha]

My irn used to eat carrots, broccoli, cucumber, sweet potato, radishes, and squash raw. He would refuse any greens and pellets. So I crushed the pellets, coated the veggies in them and success, he started to eat pellets. Unfortunately, he now refuses all veg. We're talking about grabbing and tossing all veg away from him refusal here.

I've tried everything. Baked bird bread, he pulls the veg out and eats the bread. I've cut the veg in fun shapes, steamed them, roasted them, eaten them in front of him - no success. He'll taste them, then start throwing them. I tried using them as rewards for treats and puzzles, no luck. If I coat the veg in pellet dust again, he just licks it off.

I've taken his food out at night, and he nearly went a whole day without touching any veg. I think he ate some broccali, not sure, but I finally caved and gave him pellets and some fruit.

He does like rice, beans and pasta. He'll even eat some peas and carrots with fried rice, but there's no way I can make him that every morning. He ate pasta with tomato sauce (but not the veg with it) so that gave me an idea.

What if I made a fortified marinara sauce? Cook veggies in homemade tomato sauce, blend, and just add the sauce to his pellets/grains. Do you guys think this would be a sufficient way to add veggies to his diet?

[Michael]

Why are you trying to forcefeed your parrot veggies? And why make him eat pasta sauce which is possibly bad for him? If this food refusal came on abruptly, he is probably sick and needs urgent vet care. If he is eating a seed diet and he's just not eating veggies/pellets you need a more long term approach. I'd keep a close eye on weight cause this is sending off red flags of illness.

[Khaiqha]

The pasta sauce is homemade from scratch, taking care to be bird safe. His typical diet is pellets, with seeds and fruits for training. I will schedule him for a vet check though. I'm trying to encourage him to eat vegetables because I don't believe an all pellet diet can cover everything.

[Michael]

All pellet diet is better than force feeding vegetables, pasta sauce, and things like that. If I could only go all pellet or all vegetable diet for parrots I would go all pellet.

[GlassOnion]

I think if you make tomato sauce from scratch without any salt or seasoning, it would be very healthy. An all-pellet diet causes liver and kidney problems just as an all-seed diet would.

[Ashwin1224]

Well, i do not know much about parrot nutrition but still Indian ring necks , here in india eat everything their owners eat!

It is a very common practice to keep them as pets with the lower class people. And those people cant afford any specific food for a parrot, nor do they know such things exist. So their parrots eat evrything the family has, be it cooked rice or cooked vegetable. All this include lots of spices , oil and salt. Yet most of them are quite healthy.

Can someone make sense to this phenomenon?

[Michael]

I think if you make tomato sauce from scratch without any salt or seasoning, it would be very healthy. An all-pellet diet causes liver and kidney problems just as an all-seed diet would.

That's in Budgerigars and Cockatiels. I have not seen or heard this to be true for larger parrots.

[Khaiqha]

Ashwin, you live in India? Would you mind telling me what are some of the common things specific to the country that are fed to the birds?

I'm Asian and have Asian ingredients that aren't listed on bird safe food lists because they're Eastern - things like cardamom, star anise, longan, seaweed, etc. I've been wanting to know if these were safe for birds.

[HungryBird]

Kaiqha, I believe that those food items are safe for birds. I have definitely given my birds star anise, both whole and in cooked foods, and I have also given them rambutans, which are very similar to longans. Malachite loved his rambutan actually! Star anise comes in commercial bird mixes like some of the Goldenfeast blends and it is definitely safe for birds. As for seaweed, I am not 100% sure about all kinds but I have seen sushi rolls for birds sold by Phoenix Foraging Rolls. Here is the link to their sushi:

http://www.phoenixforagingrolls.com/Sushi-to-Squawk-For-5678.htm

My only concern would be to make sure the seaweed you use is not too salty.

It can be very frustrating trying to find information on certain foods. Many times I've tried to research a new food to see if it is safe for birds and have had no luck finding anything online. When I find out the answer I always post it on my site so no one else will have to go through the torture. For example, I am currently trying to figure out if mamey is safe for birds but can't get a definitive answer. Very annoying.

Here is Malachite enjoying his rambutan! You can see his eyes going crazy!

http://hungrybirdfood.com/2011/07/02/malachite-eating-a-rambutan/

And to the original question: I think the pasta sauce idea is very interesting. I would simmer the tomatoes until they were mushy and probably add some basil because it smells great. Then I would gather the raw vegetables I was going to use, throw them in a blender, and add the pureed veggies to the tomato sauce. I would definitely stick with raw veggies, with the exception of sweet potato and things like that. It is actually a very good idea. You could mix it in well with their pellets. I'm pretty tempted to try this myself! Will you be posting pictures of it? I think it is important to offer fresh veggies to birds and I know how stubborn they can be.

[CheekyandMalolo]

A home made pasta sauce sounds wonderful! But imagine your poor walls!!
Michael, surely if you could offer your birds a completely veggie diet that met their needs then that would be better than an artificial diet like pellets??? I think my birds would be in pure bliss if they could have an entirely fruit/veg/rice diet. Mmm.