FINCHforum

I posted under another section about a female zebra that I bought two days before Christmas that had been badly plucked. She is in a cage by herself but back to back with my last male zebra. She is a real mess and I haven't been able to get any pictures of her yet but I get a kick out of watching her explore all the new foods she is getting.

I give all my finches a good varied diet and about every third or fourth day I will put vitamins in their water. I have never seen any of my finches touch the pelleted food at all until this girl came along. I put them in her fresh food plate a couple times now and she always eats at them along with the other items. My question is this, since I know she eats the pellets should I not put any vitamins in her water? I thought I read somewhere that if your birds eat the pellets they are getting enough vitamin/minerals and not to use other sources of vitamins. The pellets are not her only source of food but since she does eat at them should I stop putting the vitamins in her water?

Lisa

Using vitamins in the water is not necessary when feeding pellets. What brand are you using? All my birds eat Zupreem fruit blend for finches.

I would stop the vitamins.
I feed mine primarily pellets and do not give them vitamins. There is a danger of too much vitamins.

But keep giving her egg for her feathers.

Thanks for your advice. My pellets are the Zupreem Fruit Blend and the new girl is the only one that eats any of them. I will not add vitamins to her water anymore. I am so anxious to see how she looks when she gets feathered back in. Then I am going to try putting her together the male and hope for the best. He's had to be alone because he always plucked his partner so I hope after being alone for so long and pairing him with a female will work.

Thanks again.

One good thing, now that you have one bird eating pellets, you may be able to get others to try them. Finches are of the 'monkey see, monkey do' school. They'll be more tempted to try the pellets if they see your hen eat them. It took my birds three separate tries to convert to pellets!

Do you feed your birds any vegetables or just pellets and seed?

Diamond Sparrow wrote:Do you feed your birds any vegetables or just pellets and seed?

My birds always have seed and everyday they get a fresh food plate. During the week that will have included soak seed, veggies (corn and peas are favorites) egg food and either kale or greens from our spring mix. I also put some of the pelleted food in there. They all have cups in their cages that contain eggfood, crushed egg shell, and charcoal.

My society finch go crazy for the fresh food dish. They know it goes down after I change the paper in their cage. The whole time I'm taking paper out and putting new in they sit on the two perches right inside the door I'm working at and when the plate comes thru the cage door I sometimes don't get it on the cage bottom before one of the guys is sitting on the plate eating. They are so cool.