| Getting parakeets to eat pellets and veggies - CLICK HERE for the Pet Manual Forum Home Page |
| Lepidina |
Hi all,
I've got a pair of very stubborn parakeets that won't eat anything but
seed. The first two I had converted over to pellets pretty easily and
would eat a variety of veggies. These two snub their noses at
everything other than their junk seed and one is starting to show signs
of vitamin A deficiency. They're both about a year old and I got them
as a birthday present when they were about 4 months old so they were
already on seed.
Any help? Mixing the seed doesn't seem to work. If I take it all out
and put in the pellets, they won't eat. They ignore any other food like
cereal, cooked spaghetti (I used to have a 'keet that would beg for
spaghetti), veggies, etc. I've tried the Nutraberries but I have to
crumble them up for them to eat it. The Pretty Bird pellets weren't a
big hit and they currently are trying the Roundybush crumbles. *sigh*
And how long does it take to hand tame a parakeet? These guys are
rather resistant to that as well, little buggers.
Thanks in advance for the help!
Deb
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| jmcquown |
Lepidina wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> I've got a pair of very stubborn parakeets that won't eat anything but
> seed. The first two I had converted over to pellets pretty easily and
> would eat a variety of veggies. These two snub their noses at
> everything other than their junk seed and one is starting to show
> signs of vitamin A deficiency. They're both about a year old and I
> got them as a birthday present when they were about 4 months old so
> they were already on seed.
>
> Any help? Mixing the seed doesn't seem to work. If I take it all out
> and put in the pellets, they won't eat. They ignore any other food
> like cereal, cooked spaghetti (I used to have a 'keet that would beg
> for spaghetti), veggies, etc. I've tried the Nutraberries but I have
> to crumble them up for them to eat it. The Pretty Bird pellets
> weren't a big hit and they currently are trying the Roundybush
> crumbles. *sigh*
>
Every bird is different. I had one who *adored* celery and celery leaves
but would turn his beak up at any other kind of veggie. However, I did feed
him a seed diet with dehydrated veggies mixed in (I'm sorry, I don't recall
the brand). He lived to a ripe 14 years without ever having a pellet. No
harm, no foul.
> And how long does it take to hand tame a parakeet? These guys are
> rather resistant to that as well, little buggers.
> Thanks in advance for the help!
>
> Deb
IMHO you should have started hand-taming them when you first got them, when
they were still 4 months old. Also, having a pair of them, while nice for
each other, is a bit distracting when trying to acclaimate them to playing
with people. It's like putting a mirror in the cage and expecting the bird
to pay attention to something other than its reflection.
Jill
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| Vincent J. Hrovat |
The Australian birds ('tiels and budgies) are ground feeders in the
wild, and i've the following technique to help expand their diet to include
pellets and other foods.
I drop pellets/whatever on their clean, paper-towel covered floor, and make a
"model bird" by walking my hand around on its index and middle fingers.
Occasionally the model bird stops to eat some pellets off the "ground" with its
"beak" (my thumb and index finger) and the subject bird usually picks up the
motions and digs in. I keep the new food available on the ground for a while to
give the birds ample opportunity to follow their natural foraging instinct.
This technique presumes that your bird is friendly with Mr. Hand, so keep
working on the step-up command with them too. Good luck.
In a previous post, "Lepidina" <debfuller@gmail.com> said:
>Hi all,
>
>I've got a pair of very stubborn parakeets that won't eat anything but
>seed. The first two I had converted over to pellets pretty easily and
>would eat a variety of veggies. These two snub their noses at
>everything other than their junk seed and one is starting to show signs
>of vitamin A deficiency. They're both about a year old and I got them
>as a birthday present when they were about 4 months old so they were
>already on seed.
>
>Any help? Mixing the seed doesn't seem to work. If I take it all out
>and put in the pellets, they won't eat. They ignore any other food like
>cereal, cooked spaghetti (I used to have a 'keet that would beg for
>spaghetti), veggies, etc. I've tried the Nutraberries but I have to
>crumble them up for them to eat it. The Pretty Bird pellets weren't a
>big hit and they currently are trying the Roundybush crumbles. *sigh*
>
>And how long does it take to hand tame a parakeet? These guys are
>rather resistant to that as well, little buggers.
>Thanks in advance for the help!
>
>Deb
---
Vincent J. Hrovat / Omnia quia sunt, lumina sunt.
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