Pellets or seeds?

[roseicollis6]

Hi,

I know a healthy diet for parrots is pellets, fruit vegetables and fruits and not only seeds. But since i own a lovebird I am giving a mix of different seeds with vitamins ( HARTZ mix ). I can't find pellets anywhere but lovebirds eat seeds, vegetable and fruits naturally.
Is a pellet diet required for a lovebird? Even for parrots, giving quality seeds with vegetables and fruits is not enouph? What do pellets give more ?

[liz]

http://www.drsfostersmith.com

I give my tiels and lovies RoudyBush crumbles and the amazons get pellets. They love them. I also bought bag-o-bugs for the lovies. I don't know why they need them but they do like them.

I buy almost everything from them including cages. It is convenient and it comes right to the door most of the time with no shipping charge.

[laducockatiel]

Pellets are basically crushed up seeds with added veggies and vitamin supplements. My cockatiel has seeds and pellets to eat. He likes the Harrison's pellets, so he eats them and not just the seeds. In my opinion, pellets aren't needed, and I know some people will disagree with me, but I think that if you feed a varied diet of seeds, fruit, veggies and other healthy foods, pellets aren't needed. the only reason I feed my cockatiel pellets as well, is because he really loves them

[chadsnyder]

I have heard that birds excrement on a pellet diet has an unbelievable foulness to it. I can't get my Parrotlet to eat it but he puts it in his water and it smells terrible after sitting there for only a few hrs. Anyone find this to be a deterant for pellet feeding?

[GlassOnion]

^ Very, very false. I feed pellets, I know a lot of people who feed pellets and there should be no foul smell. Like Laducockatiel said, pellets are just ground up seeds/grains with veggies and vitamins added to them.

[Avialae]

I would say it depends.

When it comes to tiels and parakeets, my answer is a definite no when it comes to synthetic vitamins.
These birds are adapted to live almost exclusively on fresh, young seeds and sprouts, which means they have adapted to a diet pretty low on vitmins, as opposed to many other birds.
Especially for tiels it seems as like they are very sensitive to vitamin A. Studies have shown that they do better on a diet completely lacking in vitamin A than on one with too much. Too much, in this case, being way less than what many other species require. Too much results in excessive screaming and many other problems. The effects of too much viamin A can be s real pain, both in humans and other animals. (Here's the abstract for one of many studies: http://jn.nutrition.org/content/133/6/1898.short)

Note that this only goes for the "finished" vitamin A that is mostly found in supplements.
Beta-Carotene, the pre-stage for vitamin A that is found in orange, red and yellow veggies, is pretty much not possible to overdose since the body can easily get rid of any excess.
Also, most pelleted diets contain way too much protein for parakeets and tiels. Their diet should consist mostly of a lot of dirrent kinds of seeds which have been put in water 1-2 days before fed, (change the water and rinse them every 6 hours or so, keep them cool and dark.) as well as leafy greens, herbs, flowers etc.

Too much vitamin A is actually a common problem in other birds as well, and, just as in teals, can lead to a number of behvaioural issues, as well as other stuff you'd rather avoid.
I've actually looked it up, and most pellets contai up to 15-17IU of vitamin A, which is A LOT!
Harissons for example contains only 6,3 IU. With that said, if you are going to feed pellets at all, make sure it is a high quality pellet, and watch out for the vitamin A levels. Complement with veggies rich in beta-carotene.

If you have a bird that's a really picky eater, i might recommend (a good quality) pellets make up a larger part of the diet. If however your bird eats anything i strongly recommend not giving more than about 10%.
Also, be very, very careful with vitamin supplements, and never give supplements these if your bird has pellets in it's diet.

/Steph

[GlassOnion]

Great info- sprouted seeds are my saviour

[Bobioden]

I have heard that birds excrement on a pellet diet has an unbelievable foulness to it. I can't get my Parrotlet to eat it but he puts it in his water and it smells terrible after sitting there for only a few hrs. Anyone find this to be a deterant for pellet feeding?

Well YOU heard wrong, I hate how stuff like THIS gets spread as fact.