ah i thought i had saved a good recipe for mash, but i can't seem to find the bookmark.

what are some good dry mash recipes for budgies?

Legumes are a delicious, healthy addition to your bird's diet. They are a good source of protein and fiber, and they are low in fat.

What is a legume?
Legumes are a family of foods which include beans, lentils, and peas.

Which legumes should I feed?
When deciding which legumes to prepare for your birds, digestibility is a primary concern. If foods are difficult to digest they can cause an upset tummy, gas, and decreased absorption of nutrients. The easiest ones to digest are mung beans, adzuki beans, garbanzo beans/ chickpeas, lentils, sprouting peas, and split peas. The hardest ones to digest are large beans such as kidney and pinto. I choose to mainly feed the legumes that are easier to digest to my birds. Occasionally if I happen to be making a batch of other legumes for myself, such as kidney beans, I may offer some to by birds as well. However it is not a regular part of their diet. I also choose not to use 15 bean mixes and such. Not only do they contain a large amount of hard to digest legumes, but when including a large variety of legumes all in one meal they can be harder to digest as well. It's better to only feed one or two types of legumes at a time.

Where can I find them?
Look for dried legumes rather then canned. Try to find organic legumes with a smooth, rather then wrinkled, appearance. The wrinkled ones are older, and you want yours to be as fresh as possible. Most grocery stores carry dried legumes of some sort. The bulk bins of your natural foods store may have a good variety. Arrowhead Mills and Bob's Red Mill brands have packaged legumes that I've had good luck with. They are widely available at many local grocery stores and of good quality. Sun Organic has a wide variety of healthy and very high quality legumes online. They have the highest quality I've seen, even better then the bulk bins at Whole Foods. They also carry adzuki and mung beans, which can sometimes be difficult to find in local stores. Bob's Red Mill carries a variety of legumes, but they also carry a product called Vegi Soup Mix which is mostly legumes and a good base for fresh food mixes. Keep in mind most of their legumes are not organic, even though they are of good quality.

How do I prepare them?
Begin by washing legumes and discarding any which are discolored or badly formed. Check for debris in the package such as small rocks or twigs and discard them. Put them in a bowl with warm water and let soak overnight (about 8-12 hours... or up to 24). Drain, rinse, then place them in a pot with water and boil for 10 minutes uncovered, then simmer covered for 20 minutes. While cooking you can also add turmeric, garlic, cumin, or fennel to aid digestibility. The more easily digested legumes (mung, adzuki, chickpeas, lentils, and sprouting peas) can also be sprouted instead of, or in addition to, being cooked. The easiest way to do this is with an Easy Sprouter. Just make sure the tails are at least 1/4" long before you serve them. I wouldn't recommend sprouting any of the larger beans such as pinto, kidney, or black beans.

How do I serve them?
They should make up about 15% of your bird's diet, if you're not feeding pellets. The ratio of grains to legumes should be two to one... so if you feed two teaspoons of grains, feed one teaspoon of legumes. What this translates to is less then 1/2 tsp for a budgie per day and less then a tablespoon for an eclectus per day. Just to give a general idea of amounts we're talking about with different size birds. There is no need for a big bowl full of legumes.

If your bird hasn't discovered the deliciousness of legumes, try putting them through a food processor before adding them to a fresh food mix. Or just process a tiny bit with a variety of foods you know your bird already likes, then gradually increase the amount of legumes.

One of the best things about feeding legumes is that we can join in the fun as well! How about making up a batch of hummus when cooking chickpeas for your birds? Adzuki beans are great with winter squash, so try a new recipe. Or sprout some mung beans to go with salad, stir fry, or anything else you can imagine. It's healthy, delicious fun for you and the birds.

I made a big batch of "glop" last night. I used sprouted Ezekiel bread, winter squash baby food, nonfat plain yogurt, flax seed meal, broccoli, spinach, and carrot (all organic). I froze it in an ice cube tray, but now my problem is, I can't for the life of me get the cubes out!! Does anyone have tricks for this?

I'm going grocery shopping later today for some veggies to make glop for my lovies. Up until now, they've really only had cooked grain mixes, fresh raw greens since it's the only fresh food they'll readily eat, and dried fruits/veggies aside their everyday dry meals (I'm waiting on organic seeds to arrive to sprout). I was hoping to include eggplant and yam, but these have never been served to them before and I am by absolutely no means a gourmet. I've also never eaten eggplant or yam myself - the closest I've come is growing them on Harvest Moon, really.

Should I serve/mix them raw, or would there be a preferred method that would milk the most nutrients from them? I also know that fruits are particularly high in sugar. If I were to create a fruity glop mix (I'm thinking bananas, strawberries, blueberries, apples, oranges, maybe mangoes), how often would you recommend serving it?

Thanks. :)

An update on the BirdElicious species-specific caique food, since some of you were curious:

I did taste a chunk of their food, and it was really tasty. Easily chewable, not hard, and just a little bit sweet.

My birds prefer this food over every other base diet I've tried with them, including Harrison's pellets (which were the previous favorite). They've chowed through five bags of it now, and it still gets two very big zygodactyl thumbs up. :)

I still feed them a fresh-food mix as their primary diet, but this stuff is great when I'm in a hurry, when I've forgotten to thaw out their regular food, for traveling, or just for a treat. It's also really nice to have a dry food option with which to fill foraging toys, since fresh food doesn't really work well in most foragers.

I generally feed my two caiques a homemade, fresh-food diet, but I like to keep a couple varieties of dry/pelleted food around for foraging, for bird sitters, and to keep them used to a varied diet.

I recently tried BirdElicious' species specific caique food (both regular and "teenager transitional"), and my birds both LOVE it. It's the closest thing I've ever seen to my homemade stuff. All of the ingredients are recognizable human foods (except for the mealworms, but they're technically human-grade!).

Best of all, it's not actually a pelleted food! The majority of it is dried chunks of green stuff, which is clearly all of the greens that go into the food. But there are also dried bits of orange veggies, coconut shavings, pine nuts, and other whole foods mixed in. I can actually identify many of the ingredients just by looking at the food.

When I say my caiques love this food, I mean that when they see me approaching their cage with a foraging toy full of the stuff they will stop what they're doing and RUN over to where I'm hanging it up, even if they're outside their cage. They purr nonstop while pulling every chunk of the stuff out of the foraging toy. They'll crawl around the bottom of the cage eating the dropped bits later, too.

This food gets two big thumbs up in my household!

Hello all!

I posted a little while ago about doing a food conversion with my Goffins. It's been a bit of a chore trying to find places that sell what I'm looking for (Harrison's and Roudybush), as the store I was hoping would have them (Paradise Perch) just opened and they don't have them in yet (they probably will within a couple months, but seeing as my little bird's current food has pieces of rusted metal in it, I want to start the switch asap!). Anyway, I finally found a vet that carries Harrison's and while it's a bit of a drive, I'm definately getting some for her. Now, I was just wondering, which would be better to start her on - the High Potency formula (she does feather pick) or the Adult Lifetime? And which one is better for the long run?

Thank you in advance! [x-posted]

Is there any nutritional difference between canned, dried, and frozen beans? Any reason why I *shouldn't* use canned (organic, low sodium) beans in my parrots' mix?

(X-posted)

I recently posted to parrot_lovers, but since then have found this community which I think might be better suited for my question (although I'm sure people frequent both).

My 8-year-old Goffins Cockatoo has been on a pelleted diet her whole life. We buy the food in bulk from her breeder who told us it was made by people who also make food for some local, well-respected zoos. We've never really had many problems with it, until recently when I found a piece of rusted metal in it. Needless to say, I'n no longer the least bit impressed with it and want to switch her to a top brand of bird food.

As a side note, I wish I could make her food myself as many of you do, but I have a four month old baby now and it just isn't possible. I'm lucky if I can make myself something to eat each day!

I was wondering if anyone knew any foods that were specifically good for Goffins? After reading around a bit, and looking at some of the replies I had in the other community, I'm considering Harrison's as my top choice, as well as Roudybush and a couple others. I would prefer not to have something that has many different looking bits to it as she's the type of bird to pick out and eat only her favourites. Which is mainly why I want to stick to pellets. I should mention that she's been a feather picker/clipper most of her life, due - we think - to psychological issues than medical ones. It's gotten better since we moved out of my parents house, but it's still there. Are there special diets for birds like this?

I would love to know if anyone knew where to find them in Ontario, Canada as I don't want to be paying ridiculous shipping fees (especially now that we have the expense of the baby and I am no longer working). I'm ok with the shipping fees within Canada, I think, but shipping across the border isn't really going to work what with the border crossing fees that tend to be rather extravagant lately. Of course, the closer to Ontario the better! I heard of one place in Mississauga that I may be able to get to, so we'll see what they have in stock. I'm also planning on speaking with my vet to see what he recommends and if they have anything I'm interested in in stock or if they can order it in for me.

I'm also not sure what size she would take as her current pellets are quite small (the size of those small guinea pig pellets) and she doesn't seem to consider large pellets to be food. We have plenty left of her old food for the conversion - what is the best way to do that? I would like to be able to weigh her often, but she's terrified to be put on any sort of weight scale at all so I suppose I'll just have to keep a close eye on her eating habits.

She gets fresh fruits and veggies as well as pastas and other things often so I'm not worried about her that way.

Any suggestions? Thanks in advance!

I'm curious about what everyone's food prep routines are. I'm always trying to streamline things (food prep, cleaning, etc) because less time cleaning/prepping/etc means more time interacting with the animals themselves. :)

( Here's my routine )

What are you guys' routines?

besides the obvious list of foods that are big no-no's for parrots, can i assume any vegetable, fruit, grain, ect that a person would eat, my budgies can eat as well? it sounds silly to ask this, but with my other pets i'm so use to following a long list of safe or unsafe foods that i can feed. with parrots, i can't find anything long enough to feel complete, and i know how important variety is. however, even basic veggies i'm hesitant to try just because i need my wooby of a safe food list.

so, unless it's one of the flagged unsafe foods (avacado, chocolate, ect) i should be okay feeding it to my guys?

is there a gigantic safe foods list for parrots i don't know about??? i know there's just so much you can feed your parrot, and i feel like my guys are missing out. i can't even imagine adding spices to my birdie's concoctions! perhaps i'm overthinking it.

i want to try different things with the budgies, but i'm afraid to stray from my comfort zone.

uhg, help!

I switched my two caiques to a "mash" (all fresh foods and sprouted grains and legumes) diet at the end of June, so they've been on it for two months now.

It is unbelievable how vibrant and healthy they look. Their weights have remained stable, but their feathers are so glossy they're almost iridescent. Their beaks have stopped flaking like crazy, too, and they're no longer overgrown. My white bellied caique's lower beak isn't cracking and chipping as much anymore, either.

Part of this may be due to the fact that I ordered some PaHeCoNut oil (made by BirdElicious) which I mix into their food. It's a great product, and a little goes a long way. I recommend it!

No before-and-after pictures at the moment, but I'm so pleased about this that I had to post somewhere where people would actually appreciate it. :)

beak appetit? Good or bad, my mother bought it to give to my bird, but I am not so sure if it's good or bad. I don't know it could be bird junkfood in disguise. So I decided to ask you the people of Parrot_chow.


Lauren and Mozart

Because apparently I have far too much time on my hands.
( Read more... )
I actually made this quite awhile ago and was recently reminded of it, so I thought I'd fix it up a bit and post it. It's an easy visual to give you an idea of what proportions of different food groups to feed your bird if you're not using pellets or only using them as a small part of the diet. Nuts, seeds, flax seed oil, red palm oil, yogurt, egg, and other extras all go in the "treats and supplements" section.

Edit: Damn, I should proof read things. The first one had an error. It's now corrected.

Hi all! I've got a couple of questions.

Background info: I give my birds a mixture of sprouted grains and legumes, chopped veggies and dried flowers daily. They also get chunks of veggies and fruit on a skewer.

1. Now that it's hot, humid summer, I've been getting a lot of fruit flies on my birds' mash. Does anyone have any ideas for preventing this? (My birds are good foragers, so I try to put their food into mostly-enclosed foraging toys. This helps somewhat, but doesn't really prevent the problem.)

2. Over the last couple of days it's been increditly hot and humid, and my birds haven't been eating their mash or the small amount of pellets they get in a foraging toy. I'm worried! What could be causing this? It's basically the same mash they've been getting for the last couple of weeks (that's when I switched them to this diet). I've tried mixing in some fruit babyfood, which they usually LOVE, but even that doesn't tempt them. They ate a little bit in the evening when I made it really easy for them to get to, but still not much. The only change in their routine is that I've been giving them spray-bottle showers in the mornings to reduce hormonal triggers and to help keep them cool. Any ideas on what could be causing this lack of appetite?

(x-posted to the Feeding Feathers Yahoo group)

Yesterday's breakfast:
Mixed salad greens (um, everything's organic, so I'm not going to type that over and over), broccoli, frozen peas, grated and chunks of carrots, frozen blackberries/peaches/mango, a few pellets, apple cider vinegar, flaxseed oil, a sprinkle of alfalfa, red palm oil, a tsp of mash, all stirred and mixed together ... and seeds over the top for the budgies and 'tiels.

Today's breakfast:
Broccoli, greenbeans (cut into a variety of lengths), orange, "zesty" sprouts (radish and something else), a few pellets, grated garlic, a sprinkle of alfalfa, a few chamomile blossoms, a sprinkling of coconut, a drop of flaxseed oil, and a dribble of apple cider vinegar. ( I forgot to defrost mash last night, so no mash today.) The 'tiels and budgies got a sprinkling of seeds too.

"Lunch" (ie, once the fresh stuff is gone/pulled and through to mid-afternoon-ish) is dry mix of 7-grain puffed cereal, dried peas/corn/peppers, dried fruit, a variety of pastas, put into various feeding stations and foraging toys, and a foraging tube with vegetable slices, carrot greens or herbs, and an vegan cookie.

Dinner (ie, late afternoon 'til bedtime) is a different sort pellets, anything from the foraging tube not already finished, and a nut of some sort - plus any dry mix still in the foraging stations.


It's amazing to me how much the change in diet and the foraging stations have added up to birds that are more active and alert already. Now if I could just remember to setting seeds/grains to soak at night so I could add it to the morning mix, I'd be all set!

So do adzuki beans and lentils count in the "sprouted tails must be at least a 1/4" long or else you must soak and cook 'fore serving" catagory of legumes ... or not? Because I figured they did, along with pinto beans, etc., but then today I found this mix that has adzuki and lentils and garbanzo beans, etc. and says you only need to soak overnight 'fore serving.

Anyone have enlightenment for me? Was I just misunderstanding about beans/legumes, or is that sprouting mix not ok?

I haven't the brain power (fighting off the dregs of a migraine from yesterday) to go digging through the 'net to find the answers - hoping one of you has already done the digging. :)

Thanks ...

Yesterday my birds had...
Breakfast- yogurt parfait with "granola" (lowfat, organic, plain yogurt, flax seed oil, blueberries, grapes, oat groats and milk thistle seeds)

Lunch- dry mix in foraging toys and half a walnut

Dinner- cucumbers, zucchini, yellow squash, carrots, butter lettuce

Today they had...
Breakfast- warm 5 grain cereal (oats, rye, triticale, barley, golden flax), red palm oil, cinnamon, blueberries, mixed frozen veggies, sprinkle of Berry Green

Lunch- dry mix in foraging toys, almond in paper cupcake wrapper, wrapped in a corn husk, stuffed in a willow ball and hung on a long chain away from perches, dried apricot, and butter lettuce

Dinner- wheat pasta, homemade tomato sauce, yellow squash, carrots, zucchini

Their dry mix currently has:
brown rice pasta, kashi puffed cereal, just peas, and just fruit munchies for the big birds

goldenfeast australian mix, kashi puffed cereal, bob's five grain cereal, and just veggies for the little birds

What did your birds eat today?