FINCHforum

My birds typically get all of this, in individual bowls:

1. foreign finch mix, mixed with millets.
2. eggfood
3. finely crushed oyster shell
4. powered seaweed
5. charcoal
6. fonio paddy
7. thrivon plus

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My only concern is the fact that my birds have 7 seperate bowls of food, since a lot of my birds are paired in cages, that's a huge number of bowls being used and i'm wondering if I can mix some of the foods to cut down the number of bowls, i'm just not sure which foods to mix together. Does anyone have any idea which might be good to mix together?

Why not use one bowl for the supplements?

I use one dish and just divide it into quarters - great grits (a convenience mix of blue mineral grit, oystershell, charcoal, trace minerals, cinnamon, DE, etc.,), Crushed egg shell, powdered kelp, and either Charcoal or F-Vite.
After a few days the birds have made a mixture of it themselves, but it beats giving them four different dishes of each.
Sometimes I just do half powdered kelp/half egg shell.
Just depends

Anything that can remain the cage as a free-choice item goes in those treat cups with hooks, so they hang on the bars, stay out of the way, and I just refill when needed. I do this for my mineral cups, which hold either mineral grit or oystershell, charcoal, eggshell, trace minerals. I use seed hoppers for their seed, so that doesn't have to be refilled every day, and one more thing up off the floor.

Most of my cages get just one dish on the floor, that holds their eggfood and veggies--a few cages get two dishes. Anything that will cut the workload!

I mix my mineral oyster shells, charcoal, mineral dust, and eggshells all together and offer in small treat or finger cups. I will add kelp to the mix at times of moult, extra eggshell and shaved cuttle bone to breeders and young that are developing bones/feathers.
I sometimes add d. earth, beepollen, garlic, ... the birds pick out what they want and need. Sometimes the charcoal will disapear first, sometimes the eggshells....... It seems there is always some oyster shell that is left and tossed.

only ever have 3 dishes for my birds.
a huge dish for seed, another for live food and the third is for the crushed cuttlefish, crushed eggshells, charcoal & oystershell.
couldnt imagine using more dishes

These are only small dishes, max 2 inches across, high sides.

You could go to a kitchen store and get a combo dish. A dish with multiple compartments. I use one w 2 compartments for my gouldian; on one side is Miracle Meal, on the other is egg mix. This is part of an attempt to get the hen to eat egg.

I use mainly the fountain type tube feeders.

1 for water
1 for seed mixed with herb salad (chopped fine), and kelp flakes
1 for oystershell, charcoal, eggshells & grated cuttlebone

plus
1 small treat feeder with dry eggfood & dried bloodworms

This way of feeding does cause some waste, as they might toss some seed out of the way to get at their favourite, or at the herb they want...

But it saves on dishes, and keeps it simple for me. I don't have enough birds to worry about the little bit that gets wasted.

Treats get tossed on the bottom of the cage (canned mealworms, soak seed, etc. as they like to forage in the hay.

For those that mix their suppliments (egg shell, charcoal, powdered kelp, etc). Is is easy to tell which suppliment needs to be replenished? Can the birds pick out the specific suppliement, specifically the powdered kelp.

I've decided that the individual ramekins ($2 ea) that I used for each, and even the divided dishes ($3 ea) is getting expensive, for all the cages. So I want to consolidate some of the suppliments, to save on buying more dishes. I am thinking about combining the egg shell, charcoal and powdered kelp for the gouldians. Or at least combine the egg shell and charcoal.

Gary, I mix together my egg shells ( I have started asking co-workers to rinse their shells and bring them to work, this way they don't go to waste ), with charcoal, kelp, trace mineral powder and D3. This way I know that when they go to the dish they are getting everything they need. I have to refill once every week to 2 weeks.