FINCHforum

I have never used freeze dried meal worms, but there is a brand that has moist ones (but not live). They are in a little round tin can with a plastic cover and scoop. I think they are called "Can O'Worms and they are usually in the reptile section. I provided them to my zebras while they were raising a clutch and they loved them! Trouble is that you should refrigerate them and use them within a week and a half or so.

I don't know about those in particular, but someone else posted a freeze dried bloodworm meant for fish and was told that it was ok for the finches. Maybe its the case with this too? Someone else could probably tell you for sure.

Freeze dried worms are ok if they eat them. I tried that once but they didn't touch them. (only my button quail ate them, but they eat anything that is an insect, alive or dead. ) I'm not sure what finches you have but for my waxbills these freeze dried ones were probably too big and that's why they didnt like them.

I tried the can'o'crickets once and they all didn't touch them, not even the quail! They smelled terrible when i opened the can and I ended up tossing them.

I stick to the live mini mealworms frozen overnight so they cant escape. They get eaten by all of my birds and are gone shortly after I put them in the aviary in the morning.

Try Zoomed Can o Mini Mealies...Petco and Petsmart carry them. Get the mini's the other size is to big. My owls and shaft tails eat them. They smell like catfood when you open it, stick the can in the fridge and use all within a few days or toss. If they don't like tham grind them up and add over veggies.

I tried the crickets, they ignored them, the dried mealies they did not eat.

My finchs, none of them will eat the Can O Mealies or Freeze Dried Mealworms, but they LOVE freeze dried bloodworms! I buy the Hikari brand at PetSmart in the fish section.

Forgot, thank you Deborah...I used those to and some do like them also.

I have been using the freeze-dried mealworms you can buy at Wild Birds Unlimited for several years now. I mix them in with all sorts of freeze-dried aquarium fare (bloodworms, krill, daphnia, shrimp, etc.) and then sort of roughly crush it to reduce the size of the bigger mealworms and offer this daily. My finches love it and my cordons feed this to their babies in lieu of live mealworms. Ever since I stopped offering live mini mealworms and switched to this freeze-dried mix, I have not had one tossed cordon baby. The freeze-dried mealworms seem to be more the consistency of fried pork rinds. I tried offering the canned mealworms once, but my finches would not touch them and I thought they were pretty gross too.

You feed yours freeze dried krill and shrimp?

Does anyone know if I can feed frozen krill / tiny shrimp to my finches? I have some frozen krill (or really, really tiny shrimp; don't remember which) for my knifefish, don't remember the brand, but it is meant for fish. Its not freeze-dried, but frozen. If I let it defrost, would this be okay too?

I am familiar with the frozen brine shrimp and such, having once had a marine aquarium. I would be afraid to feed that stuff to my birds as it would pretty much be the equivalent of leaving raw shrimp out on your counter for hours. Everyone knows that seafood is very perishable and spoils quickly. The freeze-dried stuff is a different story - being completely dried out, it won't spoil unless it gets wet again. Just my two cents. Also, yes, I feed my birds all those freeze dried offerings mixed together that you can find in a good aquarium supply section meant. It's all high in protein, and when you think about it, all sorts of water and wading birds eat stuff like that, so, probably not much difference between water bugs and land bugs. My birds don't seem to care and consume it all with relish. And, flamingos owe their beautiful pink coloring entirely to the tiny crustacean diet they consume, so maybe it is even good to make our finches' colors more vibrant. If I spot a flamingo-pink lady gouldian in my flight, I might have to rethink it though!