The Puffer Forum

Ok riggers, tell me what kind of birds you have and/or have owned? I'm just curious lol I will know where to start once you've let me know

I have two cockatiels and one Jardine's. I am by no means an expert but I have some very good teachers.

Did someone mention cockatiels? My mated pair consists of a pied named Doc, and a gray named Samantha. (Doc's full name is actually Dr. Bombay.) So far, they've had 7 chicks total, in two batches. Both times they've produced pearls and pieds. Currently I also have one of their babies out of the first brood, Chi-Chi, returned to me by the woman who gave me her lovebirds because someone told her it was an old bird, and one out of the latest brood that I'm hand taming in preparation for the woman I just mentioned.

I also have 8 parakeets (two are English parakeets), 6 peachface lovebirds (not counting 4 chicks), and if I can ever get this woman's email to go through (keeps coming back as undeliverable), I'll soon have a Quaker.

Riggers: Thats kool! Whats a Jardine? Ok, so tell me, what would/do you feed your cockatiels daily? And what should they have daily?? I know you are no expert but I'm sure you know way more than me

Marksrush: I can't believe you have that many birds. How do you know if a cockatiel is female or male? I wish our birds would have babies but I think they're both males. Well, I know mine is, for a fact, but my fiance's might not be. I'm not even sure if the previous owner said what he was or not. My birds coloring is soooooo bright and defined were as my fiance's is kinda light and his head is marbled gray, white, which I guess is a different coloring also. It's confusing to tell.

Also, do you know how to tell male from female either, Riggers?

A jardine's is a species of african parrot in the Poicephalus genus: http://www.barrieranimalcareclinic.co.u ... arrots.pdf

Sexing
Depends on what mutation you have as to whether they can be visually sexed or not. The normal greys can be sexed in a few ways, females will have duller, more grey faces whereas males will have much brighter faces. Females also have spotting on the underside of their wings and barring on the tail. Males have these features for around 6-9 months until their first moult when they will grow in their male plumage. Sometimes females are quieter than males as well although you often get exceptions so that's not really a reliable way of sexing. Your fiancés bird may be a whiteface mutation, does it have any yellow or red/orange colouring? Whiteface females will keep the grey face and tail barring similarly to the normals, but there are some cross mutations, so I couldn't say for sure. If you have any pics I might be able to ID the mutation.

Diet
Daily mine usually get a recipe I cook up for them. It is a base of Long Grain Brown Rice, Basmati & Wild Rice Mix, Red Split Lentils, Buckwheat, Amaranth, Jumbo Oats and Wholewheat Pasta Shells which is all cooked up in a saucepan. Then I add some fruit or veggies to that, for example my last batch had peas, sweet corn, carrot, broccoli, ramiro pepper, sweet potato and a tad of spinach. I make enough for about a week and freeze the portions. If I fall behind and don't get round to making a batch they just get the fresh stuff on its own. With the mix though I serve it in the morning and then change it out for a bit of seed in the afternoon. You can change the ingredients with the seasons, so during the spring season you can add more veg which contains higher protein for example. In reference to the supplements, I should explain why I don't feed them. The main reason is that they can get all the vitamins they need from food, so the carrots and sweet potatoes are a good source of beta-carotene, a precursor of vitamin A which the body breaks down into enough vitamin A as it needs and gets rid of the rest. Vitamin A supplements however contain vitamin A in its final form, and they cannot just expel what they don't need as it is fat soluble, so it just builds up and can easily result in vitamin A toxicity (Hypervitaminosis A). If you're interested, this is an interesting read: http://jn.nutrition.org/cgi/content/full/133/6/1898

So basically natural foods are always preferable over man made stuff and supplements, it's just all round healthier and the way they are adapted to eat. So just be sure to feed a wide variety of stuff and they will be healthy tiels. Just be careful with certain foods like spinach not to feed too much, despite being a good source of calcium, the oxalic acids they contain can bind calcium and prevent its absorption if fed too much. If ever in doubt, don't feed it and look online, there are some good resources out there.

Hope that is of some help

Most of my birds are rescues, Mrs.Puff. The only one I've paid for is Doc. Also it helps that I get all my feed at a substantial discount, and I buy in bulk so again there's some cost savings.

we have a very old cockatiel called clyde and an african grey (who is very funny) called scooby

Me and my fiance' have the grey cockatiels, I'm pretty sure they are both males. They both have yellow faces, and their crests are both yellow too. I'm going to start to feed ours more natural and fresh stuff. But I have a question...why do you mostly feed them stuff that you make? Isn't a staple diet that you buy from the store enough? Or do you just spoil them lol

Depends what staple diet you buy. Pellets are no good as a staple in my opinion, and there are some pretty bad seed mixes as well, but a good seed mix is OK, the one I get contains 30 varieties of seed and not too many sunflowers. I've seen some containing about 5 varieties and have about 50% sunflowers, so they wouldn't be good. Even with a good seed mix though, it's important they gets loads of fresh produce and just some seed. Despite being granivores in the wild, they would be using up so much energy every day flying that they burn away most of the fat, whereas in captivity they are not doing that kind of strenuous exercise, especially if they're clipped, so the fat builds up and you get fatty liver disease. That's why I feed the seed in the afternoon, so they don't gorge themselves and leave no room for fresh stuff.

The reason I cook the food up is because I feel that is the best diet I can give them, it provides a lot of variety and the birds love it and get a bit of everything cause it's all mixed in together. Of course you don't have to feed fresh stuff that way, there are some other interesting ways to feed veg, I know someone who hangs carrot tops in the cage and her budgies love that, and someone else has said they make perches out of carrots. You can also make those kebab type things with bits of fruit veg threaded on. All sorts of things you can do, the key is just to offer lots of variety so they get everything their bodies need.

Ok, so tell me again...what kinds of things you feed/cook for them? And how do you do it? As of now, I've stopped giving our birds vitamins.

Basically I make up a base which consists of the following ingredients:

• Long Grain Brown Rice
  Basmati & Wild Rice Mix
  Red Split Lentils
  Buckwheat
  Amaranth
  Jumbo Oats
  Wholewheat Pasta Shells

I cook all that up for about 30 mins in total, I believe a couple of the packets say to cook for like 40 mins but seeing as I'm not cooking for human consumption I ignore that. I then just add whatever fruits or veggies I have bought for that batch raw, apart from the sweet potato which I cook and then chop or you can mash, whatever the bird prefers. Once it's completely cooled I divide it up into freezer bags and freeze each portion for thawing out every morning. So that is what they get in the morning, and in the afternoon I clear out the mess and replace with some good seed mix.

As long as you feed good variety you shouldn't need to use the supplements unless for a medical reason. The only supplement I would say to use is the calcium+D3 supplements. Calcium cannot be taken up by the body if the bird is not getting enough vitamin D3. If you have a harness and can take the birds outside to get natural sunlight every day, there should not be a problem because UVB radiation from the sun is used to produce VD3. But this is obviously hard to do so there are supplements which contain both calcium and vitamin D3, ensuring the calcium can be taken in, one such supplement is called calciboost. This can be given around once a week if you think your birds aren't getting much D3 from anywhere else. You just need to be careful not to give too much as it causes fatty build up in the liver and because the supplements also contain calcium, they will be taking in too much calcium as well.

I totally disagree with riggers concerning pellets. Well, that is, as long as you buy quality pellets, like ZuPreem...I don't know about other brands. The only real problem with them is that the bird gets a little bored with them, so you have to supplement them with seed mixes and other food items that they enjoy and which are healthy. I know a lot of people make their own mix, and I suppose that's fine, but I seriously doubt that there is the nutrient concentration in such a mix compared to something like ZuPreem pellets.

Actually birds can get all they need from natural foods, and it's all better quality than the stuff you would find in pellets formulated originally for domestic poultry. Have a look at this article: http://jn.nutrition.org/cgi/content/full/133/6/1898.

Vitamin A is in much too high a concentration in pellets and because it is in its final form they can't excrete what they don't need, so it builds up in the liver and causes vitamin A toxicity. When feeding fresh food, you can feed stuff rich in beta carotene (carrots are the old favourite). Beta carotene can be used to make as much vitamin A the body needs and any extra is got rid of so you don't run the risk of toxicity. Similar with the calcium+D3 supplements they put in there, there's too much in there to start with so when you feed it every day the D3 causes fatty build ups and too much of the calcium is absorbed, so you get fatty liver disease and calcium toxicity. Many pellets (not Harrison's or TOPS) have all sorts of colourings and flavourings and preservatives in them as well which is not really healthy for our birds. Don't forget as well that all parrot species are different so one pellet can't possibly hope to cover all the their nutritional needs, especially when they were originally designed for poultry use. The two best pellets are probably Harrison's or TOPS (TOPS has the added benefit of no soy as well). Although nothing any of them can overcome is, like you say, the fact they are boring. I've tried them myself and they weren't very tasty and a bit dry, I wouldn't want to eat a load of them, and for me it's important to give a mentally simulating diet which is also healthy.

Fed as a small treat they are fine but just not as a staple and not free fed.

Funny you should mention their taste: I insist on tasting most of my animals' foods. ZuPreem fruit pellets are pretty darn good, actually. Surprisingly good, in fact. My bun-bun loves them too, they're like bunny crack.

Interesting article you provided the link to, thanks. All my birds (lovebirds, parakeets, and cockatiels) get both ZuPreem fruit pellets and SunSeed seed mixes. Breeding parents also get chopped hardboiled eggs with the shells. I'm trying to introduce them to veggies and fruits but they don't ever seem to be too interested in them. I'm open to trying the home-made approach, but I have to be certain it's going to be good for them and contain enough nutrition. I mean if it keeps me from having to spend $40 every month for a 17.5 lb bag of pellets, I'm all for it, but the cost is secondary to getting my birds good nutrition.

As long as you give variety there is no reason why it shouldn't provide better nutrition than pellets. Some birds take to fruit and veg in different ways, I know people who say their smaller birds prefer the whole fruit/veg rather than chopped up, so they hang the veggies up or make perches out of them etc. Then there are some birds who prefer a 'mash' of fruit and veg where it's all chopped up really small.