Soaked Seeds

bonnies_gouldians · Post by **bonnies_gouldians** » Sat Nov 29, 2008 7:22 pm

I hear (read) a lot about using soaked seeds; what are they soaked in? Water, apple juice? What do you add to them? Vitamins/calcium?

L in Ontario · Post by **L in Ontario** » Sat Nov 29, 2008 8:09 pm

I soak my soak seed in water and (about) a teaspoon of apple cider vinegar for 12 - 24 hours. Rinse in a sieve with clear water (really, REALLY) well and drain well to remove as much water as possible. Then I hardboil a couple of eggs for 15 mins then toss them into a food processor for a few seconds (shell and all). Then I mix the crumbled egg & shell mix with the drained soak seed and dish it out to the finches. They jump all over it.

Today for the first time I added mealworms (in a can from Fairest Finches) to the eggs in the food processor (yuck!) and mixed with the soak seed - the finches devoured everything!

bonnies_gouldians · Post by **bonnies_gouldians** » Sat Nov 29, 2008 8:11 pm

so if you dry them and rinse them, what is the point of soaking them in the first place? I dont mean to sound rude, it just doesnt make sense...does the vinegar do something for them?

L in Ontario · Post by **L in Ontario** » Sat Nov 29, 2008 8:17 pm

I don't dry them - just drain real well to remove all dripping water. The soaking softens them up and makes them start to swell just a bit in preparate to sprouting - though they do not sprout. But in the act to getting ready to sprout they develop more vitamins which is very beneficial to the birds. You don't want to serve the soak seed dripping wet as it would start to get bacteria growing sitting in the cage at room temperature (or warmer for outside aviaries) for a number of hours.

Hope that helps.

bonnies_gouldians · Post by **bonnies_gouldians** » Sat Nov 29, 2008 8:46 pm

yeah...I am a 'tard. I read your post and responded, then decided to look up a little more about soaking seeds with google (only as a back up, I dont trust most of those sites as anyone can put anything on the internet nowadays) and realized why you wet and drained them. Thanks for the info I will give this a shot and see if the little buggers will eat it.

L in Ontario · Post by **L in Ontario** » Sat Nov 29, 2008 9:17 pm

No problem - we all have to research things to make sure they are safe for our fids.