What Are They Looking For?

[30 Seconds to Bob]

Since my javas had their babies, they've been picking through their seed more, throwing a tremendous amount on the cage floor. They never used to do this. I provide them with a mix of premium canary and premium budgie seeds. Both mixes contain pellets and dried fruits and veggies.
I also give them fresh egg food, sprouted seeds, a fresh fruit or veggie, a hardboiled egg and a piece of multigrain bread every morning. I give them a commercial dry eggfood when I get home from work. Any reason why they're digging through and wasting so much seed as of late? Bob

[ac12]

My guess is that they are looking for a specific seed or seeds.
Most of my finches will throw out or ignore the dark seeds and go for the light ones. On the other hand, my wife's canary will go for the dark seeds first, then the light ones.

Try to see which seeds they are eating, by looking for the hulls. This will give you a clue as to what might be going on.

Over time, their diet may change, pre-breeding, breeding, molting, resting.

Also, birds are like kids, they don't always eat what is best for them. They will go for what they want. Sort of like go for the cake and candy, ignore the meat and veggies.

[PrettyBird]

I agree with Gary.

My gouldians that have the chicks are very picky right now as to what seeds they want to eat.
They have sift through an entire feeder of seed to get to the seeds they want, leaving a huge pile of wasted seed all over the bottom of the cage

I finally figure out what seeds they were wanting, and went out and bought canary seed (grass kind)
Thats what they prefer to feed their babies, and some wh. prosso.
I still have their other seed mix in the cage for them to pick at, but they go for those canary grass seeds first over anythign.

Im sure once babies are weaned they will go back to their regular diet, and not waste so much D**m seed! lol

[cindy]

I found that any seed with pellets in it as part of the brands mix are usually hard and the birds never eat it. I would buy a straight parakeet and finch mix, skip the "fortified" (they do not usually eat the colored seed that are fortified, I would not count on them getting much vitamin or mineral intake from it since the seed hull is coated and they don't eat the hull.) Skip the ones that include the pellets premixed in it. Add Zupreem fruit blends (they changed the size back to the original xsmall size, picked up a bag at PetSmart) or try Roudybush Nibbles.

Try KayTee supreme finch http://www.petsolutions.com/C/Canary-Fi ... ign=nextag

Suburban Feed store on 52 stocks it...call first to see if they have the 25lb bag in. I think you can buy small quanities...the kind you bag yourself.

[30 Seconds to Bob]

Thank you all very much for the responses - much appreciated! This would all make sense EXCEPT for the fact that none of this seed throwing had been going on until they started feeding the babies. I've used the same fortified canary mix for quite a few years now although I don't rely on that for them to get all the necessary nutrition. My birds generally do a pretty good job with the seed and I figure the little "extras" inside can't hurt.
My thoughts are that there is something lacking in the diet that they feel is necessary to feed the chicks. They don't really touch the hardboiled egg but gobble up the home made egg food and the sprouted seed. Maybe it's a java thing. Maybe there is one specific seed that I'm failing to provide. Bob

[wellingtoncdm]

Javas love oat groats. Try offering those separately to see if they still toss seed.

[Diana]

My javas adore hemp and they keep on making a mess in order to find hemp in the seed mix.

[30 Seconds to Bob]

I have some hemp seed on hand and I'm going to pick up some oat groats. Bob

[debbie276]

When I had java they seemed to like the bigger seeds, have you tried offering Paddy Rice? My java's looked for and loved Paddy Rice though it's probably more what they are used to.