KIBBLES AND BITS????

[lovezebs]

Hello.
Do any of you find these dyed bits of junk in your seeds? AND, does anyones birdies actually eat them???

I find these things in some of the seed mixtures, and I wonder if I'm paying more money for these silly things, that none of my birds eat, EVER. I call them 'kibbles and bits' because they remind me of that cheap stuff that sells as dog food ( which I think is made out if play dough). I have yet to find an empty hull of any of these things, and I wondered if any one else had questions regarding this manufacturer's practice?

What is the purpose of kibbles n bits in our bird seed???

~Elana~

[MiaCarter]

My finches don't eat any of that junk.
They leave the colored chunks and eat seeds only, so I switched to a pure seed mix for less wastage. (And to be honest, I don't love products that are colored, esp. for MY benefit.)

The hookbills love those little chunks, though.
My husband got a parakeet/cockatiel mix with all sorts of little chunks and bits and some bigger seeds. They go for all the kibbles and bits first, then the seeds once the good stuff is gone.
Most of the kibbles n bits are naturally colored, but there are a couple that are dyed. So I'm on the lookout for one that has all the kibbles and bits without dyes (good luck.)

The kibbles and bits in my mix are mostly little dog food looking things. Those they eat entirely. There are also bigger seeds and they do eat those.

I also dislike the dyed foods because they can skew the color of their poop, making it more difficult to determine if there's a problem.

[Colt]

lol lovezebs The "kibbles and bits" are actually most often colored pellets and in some cases oat groats.

The coloring serves no purpose except to make humans think the seed is prettier so we'll buy it over a seed mix that is more plain.

Some hookbills will actually prefer certain colors over others creating a lot of wastage. I had a friend who bred birds and one pair of Quakers preferred the reds, oranges, and yellows while the other pair preferred blue and green. He switched their bowls every other day. lol When the company added a purple pellet into their diet none of his birds would eat them. They'd throw them out or leave them in the bowls. That's why when I do feed pellets I prefer Roudybush because the pellets are uniform in color and size.

That being said I've hard a terrible time converting any of my birds to pellets so they just get mixed into their egg food.

[lovezebs]

MiaCarter
Hey Mia.
Don't like these silly things. From now on, will make a great effort to buy undyed seeds. The thing that makes me really wonder, is that the mixes with the coloured seeds tend to be somewhat more expensive . Go figure.

~Elana~

[lovezebs]

Colt
"Pretty" seeds for people. Oye! What nonsense.
I wondered if they were supposed to be coated with vitamines or something actually beneficial, but dyed just to make them pretty, that's just silly. Plus, I wonder what kind of dyes they use, seeing as the birds don't want to eat them.

Re: Pellets. I tried some, and no one would eat them . Not mixed, not crushed, not Isprinkled. I threw them outside, and guess what? Not even the hungry outdoor residents would touch them.
My opinion, birds in the wild don't have pellets, never had pellets, and do just fine. So seeds are good enough for my guys as well. I think it's one of those gimmicks that the manufacturer's try to convince us the consumer, that we have to have or our poor birds won't survive. Just like dogs and cats can't live without store bought kibble, fortified with God knows what (remember the pet food recall of a few years ago?) How on earth did pet animals manage to live for thousands of years without pet food factories???

~Elana~

[MiaCarter]

Well what's more, there's a red/orange dye that can be harmful to birds, causing organ failure in some birds.

Someone mentioned it here, in fact. That's where I learned about it. I researched it at the time but I forget which dye it was. Maybe red no 5? Not positive.

This actually makes me wonder about the difference between the plain seed mix I buy in the pet section and the 25-lb bags that they sell for outdoor birds.

The outdoor bird seed is WAY cheaper and it has all the same seeds (in fact, some have a larger variety with 1 or 2 additional kinds of seed.) This aside, I can't seem to figure out how it's different.

The pet bird seed says "fortified" but I'm sure any fortification is very minimal and that my supplements and fresh foods would easily close any nutritional gaps.

I highly suspect I'm spending 10x more on "pet bird" seeds which are basically the same as the 25-pound bag of wild finch seed.

[Sheather]

MiaCarter Lovezebs

Yep. They're dyed oat groats. Most small finches don't like them.

I feed my birds wild finch seed (offered in a hanging feeder) and they love it and do great, it contains all sorts of seeds; canary, three millets, rape, thistle... a few others. And it's so much cheaper than pet shop mixes which contain less seeds and in my experience actually are dustier. Between hookbills, finches, and canaries, every bit of it gets eaten. I also feed a basic parakeet mix, which is full of oats (like the colored ones in your mix). The small finches hate them, but my hookbills and Javas eat these up, though besides the oats the budgie food is mostly just millets. I also feed Zupreem pellets of a few brands and always have available a catfood bowl of finch size, budgie size, and then the cockatiel pellet/foraging mix all together that everyone can pick through for what they need. So that's two food bowls and a bird feeder, not too bad. I find all the birds pick from every available option, not only their own species-specific sort of food, and that the budgies actually prefer finch seed to parakeet seed while the Javas prefer parakeet seed to finch seed.

All of my birds eat pellets just fine; the societies seem to love them. They don't eat them exclusively and most prefer seed when it's available, so I just see it as ensuring they get a few more vitamins and a more diverse diet overall. They're a supplement, not a main course, most of the time (although Gracie the cockatiel really prefers them to seed as he has been raised on them for his entire life).

[MiaCarter]

Sheather -- What brand of wild finch bird seed to you feed?

I really should switch to this if it's safe and basically the same.

They get a diverse enough diet and supplements, so I'm not worried on them missing out on any "fortification" that's in the pet bird seed. (I'm sure the fortification is quite minimal.)

Is it honestly safe? Seems too good to be true that it could be the same seed, same basic quality, but a fraction of the price.

[Sheather]

MiaCarter - I've bought a number of brands, even at supermarkets or WalMart, as long as they have the same mix of seeds and the seeds inside look shiny and fresh, I've never had a problem. I also scatter the seed in my big planters to sprout for the birds to pick at and these have always sprouted so I know they've been fresh.

Because buying 20 pounds of seed at once, even for a bunch of birds, takes a while to go through, I only keep a full coffee can on hand and freeze the rest at any one time.

[Colt]

The wild bird seed I can find has so much milo in it, and most birds won't eat that. And I can't find anything that doesn't have sunflower seeds. My Javas might be able to eat those, but I doubt anything else would touch them.

[Sheather]

Colt - basic wild bird mixes intended for sparrows, doves, or cardinals or anything else are not at all suitable for finches. I tend to call these "bags of crap" as they're pretty much just milo, corn, and sunflowers, which pet birds will not even touch.

What you want is wild finch blend seed - they sell it here. Not the bag of just thistle seed, it's a mix of small millets and canary seed and all sorts of tasty little seeds meant to attract goldfinches, siskins, and housefinches - and it contains all the little seeds our pets need too.

Nunn-Better, though a horrid company as far as dog food or cat food brands, actually puts out a nice seedmix I can find at my local store, always fresh and containing all the necessary ingredients. I trust it because unlike the catfood it's all natural ingredients and not processed, I can see just what is in it, so I know it isn't unhealthy.

[Sheather]

Wow I am sorry for the four posts, my internet went out during that and when it came it sent four times D:

[Sheather]

I apologize for accidentally sending that four times...

[wilkifam]

Re: Pellets. I tried some, and no one would eat them . Not mixed, not crushed, not Isprinkled. I threw them outside, and guess what? Not even the hungry outdoor residents would touch them.
My opinion, birds in the wild don't have pellets, never had pellets, and do just fine. So seeds are good enough for my guys as well.

I agree 100% and have also tried pellets more than once with no luck. I buy seeds from Herman Brothers, and it is just a nice special finch mix which everyone lives.

My hookbills LOVE pellets.

[Rox]

We also get that 'junk' in some of our seed mixes. I tried it once and even my faithful canaries, who eat anything and everything, avoided the colored bits.

Nature doesn't provide pink or blue seeds. I honestly wonder sometimes where, and if, the producers of these mixes actually test to see if finches would eat it