FINCHforum

Hello,

I have four Gouldians who won't eat vegetables. no matter how i serve it to them...
I tried all sorts of vegetables - chopped, sliced, whole.
Why could that be?
Also, they never nibble on the iodine block.

What should I do?

Thank you.

Mine don't go for veggies either but LOVE their hard boiled egg! I wouldn't worry too much.

Gouldians can be quite the picky bird. Most breeders use a teacher bird ie the canary to introduce new food to the goulds.

Thank you.

Mine love hard boild eggs as well.
As for a teacher bird. I heard about that but, I have no other birds...

What type of veggies are you feeding?
My gouldians were so picky the first year I got them.
They wouldnt touch any veggies let alone egg food.

It took alot of persistance and trying veggies in many ways (as well as egg food) till they finally ate it.

To get them to try egg food, I mashed the egg, crushed the shell, and added some cornmeal, and toasted multigrain bread.
I took out all the seed in the cage, and put the dish of egg food in, I sprinkled a little seed on top.

With veggies, I tried the dark leafy greens first. Dark leafy lettuce, bok choy or spinach. I had it shredded peices at first, and they wouldnt go for it. I then Just ripped of big pieces and put it down with the dish of seed. They went right for it.
They took a year to eat carrots. What I do is shred them with a cheese grater. Red bell peppers they love now as well, I mince them in tiny pieces.
Broccoli I take a knife and shave the green tops off.

Just keep trying

Thank you Dee!
That sounds right.

I agree. I used a food processor and pulse it to chop/mix carrots, broccoli and sweet peppers for my finches. They love it this way and it's about the size of the seeds. Then, I just scoop a TBS per cage with their seed and eggfood on a paper plate (ease of clean up). It is all gone by the afternoon feeding.

My canary and orange faced star finch LOVE their greens and eat as much as I can give them. My other red faced star finch will nibble occasionally, but really DOESN"T like greens much. Maybe its an individual thing for different birds.

I started mine by making a mix of chopped hardboiled egg + chopped lettuce + chopped carrots, then I sprinkled seeds over the top of the mix. They were attracted by the seeds, then eventually they "tried" the stuff under the seeds. Even now, I sprinkle seeds over their egg+veggie mix.

Give them time, eventually they will try it.