FINCHforum

My budgies are still being recalcitrant about eating their veggies. Part of the problem is that I really need to chop the veggies for them as they can't seem to handle a whole leaf.

But when I chop them they go off a lot faster.

So I had a sudden lightbulb moment. Here's my bright idea:

What if I dehydrated their veggies slightly? Not all the way to crunchiness maybe but enough to dry them out so they don't rot in 15 minutes. The poor things can't really handle veggies if I don't chop them.

Currently we are annoying the heck out of each other with my you-must-eat-your-veggies regime, which is that I chop a small amount of salad greens and veggies, put them in a seed cup, and sprinkle about a teaspoon of seed over them. Then I wait until they ignore the seed cup for at least 15 minutes running. Then I sprinkle another tsp of seed on top and put it back. Repeat until either all the veggies are gone (has yet to happen) or 2 hours, then I remove the cup, toss anything in it, wait 2 hours, and start over with fresh greens and seed.

I have to hand chop each time - my mini-Cuisinart turns the veggies into mush and they won't touch them at all then. So its getting kind of wearing on my decrepit self to keep chopping and replacing their veggies all day, LOL!

So maybe dehydrating some veggies would let me chop them without turning them into mush? Or maybe I could dehydrate the mush and they'd have veggie flakes ...

Sojourner

I don't know.

It all sounds so complicated somehow.....

https://youtu.be/4TWui9298KE

https://youtu.be/rRXYkw-pgbY

I get the impression you worry yourself way too much about your birds.

If they like veggies, good! If they don't, give them some supplemental vitamins or switch to pellets. Parakeets have sharp hooked bills and can absolutely handle whole veggies if they want to. In the wild they chew holes into the trunks of trees.

PS: I would usually leave vegetable for 24 hours and the birds would graze at their leisure, no need to rush to get anything out of the cage. It's plants, not animal protein.

I've had parakeets that don't seem to eat much green-leaved food. I started putting in several whole leaves of romaine or kale, in a bunch pinned to the side of the cage. If the leaves are a little wet, the parakeets got into them and sort of took a bath that way. Pretty soon they were nibbling them.

Dave

Yup, same here.

Sheather

Dave

Given that these guys are supposed to have a diet that is 80% to 90% fresh food, I don't see it as "worrying too much". Right now they are on a 98% seed diet. They will nibble the veggies but they aren't really eating them and its been nearly a year.

On an all seed diet you're lucky if your parakeet lasts 7 or 8 years. Five years is often given as "budgie lifespan" - I believe that is because people feed them solely on seed, or pellets which IMO is a worse choice than a variety of seed.

There is not a scrap of empirical evidence to support the idea that pellet diets are even safe or "balanced" in any way, let alone somehow superior to a normal diet of mostly greens and some seed. There is quite a bit of evidence to support the idea that a pellet diet is actually detrimental for breeding finches. There is also the issue of sufficient dietary fiber. Plus, the vast majority of pellets are chock-full of fillers such as corn and day-glo dyes.

No offense intended, but there will be no pellets here. That'd be a step in the wrong direction.

On a proper diet they can live twice as long, or more. I had a friend who had a 20 year old parakeet - who DID eat his veggies.

I have been told that the reason they can't seem to handle whole fruits/veggies/leafs - is that unlike other parrots, they can't use their feet to manipulate items. I was told to clip stuff to the sides of the cage. I did that with a banana chip (among other things) and all that resulted in was that they now use that banana chip as a head-scratcher, LOL!

I do clip leaves to the sides of their cage and they completely ignore them. They completely ignore the bath, too. My guys are EXTREMELY paranoid and suspicious, even for parakeets. A little bit ago I put a piece of dried bread in one of their seed cups just to see what they would do.

You would think I had added a snake to the cage. They won't even go to that side of the cage now.

They absolutely will not go willingly into the bottom of the cage as there is a plastic tray that is higher than they are tall. So they can't see out when they are down there. The only way they will go down there is if there is a clump of millet spray that falls to the bottom of the cage - and then they are nervous and antsy the whole time, LOL!!

lovezebs

Yes, it is in fact THAT complicated. If you have parakeets that have been taught by other parakeets that greens are safe to eat, you're sitting pretty. However the "norm" amongst pet-store parakeets is that the poor things have never even SEEN "greens", let alone been taught to eat them.

My guys will still barely touch their greens even after the better part of a year. It's a problem. I do my level best to provide a wholesome diet, and seed-only as they are now (or virtually seed-only) will shorten their lives by 50%, if not more.

Please note that my finches had no problem taking to the greens. Perhaps they are just smarter than the average bird - or at least the average parakeet, LOL!

So - back to the original question - is anyone feeding dehydrated veggies? And did you dehydrate them yourself or are you buying a commercial product?

Sojourner, interesting post.

From what I've read, most birds have a 'curiosity' phase as they are growing up. They learn food preferences when they're young and those preferences can't be easily changed in adulthood. If at all. Your post says the same thing.

Ravens are a bird species that stay curious as adults, they keep learning and that is part of why we say Ravens are so smart.

Can you put a greens-loving bird in the Parakeet's enclosure? I've had finches and Parakeets together before, and never seen a problem. (it was a walk-in aviary, though). Those store-bought Parakeets did learn to eat greens, I think from the finches.

Can you take all the seed away in the night, so that from daybreak on they only have vegetables for a few hours? Force them to be curious? I've done that sort of process before and it helped.

Do your Parakeet's get plenty of exercise? I think free-flight time, or a big walk-in aviary can overcome some nutrition problems. I have no data to support that idea, just observation.

I had a Pigeon veterinarian tell me once that corn, milo, wheat and peas (plus calcium and some other minerals) are all that a Pigeon needs and they can internally manufacture everything they need from those foods. Pigeons are different, of course, but seldom eat greens.

I'm a believer in the idea that a bird will balance its' own diet, but I also agree that Parakeets don't seem to buy into that idea. What is a Parakeet's diet in the Australian desert? Probably not much greens, but I don't know.

Wild parakeets eat mostly spinifex grass seed which is dry for all but a few months of the year.

Dave Sheather

In the wild they eat seeds (often in the milk stage which is a LOT different from the dry seed they get in captivity), vegetation, fruits, and berries.

They are ground feeders but I can't get my guys to go into the bottom of their cage at present. They can't see over the top of the plastic bottom so they don't like it down there, they feel they are in danger if they can't see clearly.

They are in a "cockatiel" cage which does not have sufficient room for them to fly but does have toys and ladders and a swing so they remain as active as possible. I have 2 of the Prevue F040 cages and a dremel tool to be stuck together soon to make one big flight cage.

They will nibble the greens but that's about all. Perhaps I should be trying grapes and apples and some other fruit as well. My finches pretty much reject all fruit so I hadn't thought of it for the parakeets.

I keep getting different info regarding how they manage to eat. I've been told that because they can't manipulate food with their feet as other parrots do that I have to chop up anything I offer them. But then how do they manage in the wild? Perhaps if I can find some video of budgies feeding in the wild that would help.

In the meantime I'm getting the dehydrator and see if that will help. Fresh would be better but whatever it takes to stuff something other than millet, oats, and canary reed grass seed into their tiny little gullets, LOL!

Besides I have hankering for dried apples - which have to be the most expensive dried fruit on the planet. Every once in awhile I break down and buy some dried apples and then I'm shocked to discover I just paid $4 or $5 for what amounts to maybe one apple or less in the whole bag, LOL!

Plus - I can use the dehydrator to ferment dosa and idli batter. Since moving here I have not been able to find a spot that the batter will ferment in rather than either just not ferment at all, or it gets too warm and grows slimy pink stuff.

And finally I can use the dehydrator to bake my favorite low-temp never crack cheesecakes in. A conventional oven just can't be set that low reliably.

So - many purposes for the dehydrator (square kind that has trays like your oven trays, not the round one). And maybe my silly birds will start eating SOMETHING other than their seeds and extend their silly little lives.

Good advice posted here. I give my birds a mix. Like today, I made egg and broccoli. But I use powdered greens on seeds and dried greens with seeds sometimes too.

Sojourner

I'm eager to hear how the dehydrated veggie experiment goes. Please post updates when you can!

Nicole

Nicole R.

Will do. Also I hope to post a video to youtube soonish about how to alter 2 Prevue F040 cages (or is that F050? The one that is 30" long) to make a 5' flight cage.

I just can't decide who to put in it.

Sojourner

Can't wait to see your video - because joining two of them is our next project. Just ordered our second cage tonight!

Nicole

sojourner

We're onto you, we know you just want that dehydrator!

I'm curious though, why do you want the vegetables to only be slightly dehydrated/not crunchy?

Kaytee sells a product that has dehydrated kale, alfalfa leaves, parsley, chia seed, and sweet potato. My finches seem to really like it, and I do not feed them fresh vegetables daily. (They also wont eat any leafy greens like kale, romaine, etc.)

GouldieFledge

I figured that slightly-dried out would be good enough to stop the rot, yet maybe still moist enough to encourage them to eventually start eating actual fresh greens. Probably more so with fruit than leafy greens, actually.

Probably unlikely, especially given that I can air-dry things like kale to full crunchiness in less than 24 hours here in this desert climate. Once its partially dried the dry desert air here will probably just suck the rest of the moisture out lickety-split anyway.

I really just want them to eat their veggies and live a long time so I don't have to cry so often when they die.