How To Soften Pellets Without Wasting Them

[byrdmane]

Hello,

I'm trying to convert two of my canaries to eating pellets (Lafeber's). What I'm noticing is that the pellets might be too hard for them to crunch down. That and the habit of hulling their seeds means that they spit out the pellets mostly uneaten before screaming in distress.

Now I've soaked some apple sauce into the pellets and they're receiving the pellets a little more nicely but I'm afraid that this may lead to them expecting wet, apple-flavored, mushy pellets and rejecting normal, dry pellets.

With my job, I don't really have the schedule to change out the food dish every few hours to prevent them from eating damp, spoiled pellets. I don't want them to starve while I'm at work because they're spitting out the dry pellets, but I do want them to have the benefits of a pellet diet.

Any thoughts? Some spoil-free softening trick? Grind up the pellets? Switch back to seed?

[cindy]

You can try adding a little water just past the top of the pellets and microwave them until the water is absorbed... let them cool a little and serve warm. This is corn based so wetting it and leaving it out can grow mold. I would mix the pellets in the seed.

[debbie276]

In my opinion birds should have seed available at all times and not be on a pellet only diet.

[Sheather]

I had one canary who was tricky to convert, I started him on pellets by mixing them in eggfood and gradually offering them with less and less egg until he accepted them dry. He was the only bird I had which didn't immediately accept pellet foods.

I feed a diet about half and half pellets and seed mix plus daily fresh food.

[Sally]

I tried an all-pellet diet at one time, but I found that my birds became very quiet and not so active. Once I offered seed to them again, they started singing and flying around their cages once more. Even vets are now recommending that birds be offered both seed and pellets.