admin | African Grey Parrot Centre ™ Articles - Part 6

Giving your parrot the wrong bird diet can result in the death of your feathered friend. Yes, this is a fact. Feeding your parrot the right bird diet, however, can help ensure health and longevity for your beloved bird. Only in the last few decades has research revealed which foods are deadly to parrots and which are the best choices for them.

The main benefit of making sure your parrots diet contains the right foods is longevity. Just as people can live longer when eating a healthy diet, so can your companion parrot. It was only come to light in recent decades that parrots can live long lives if properly fed a wide variety of foods.

Healthy Parrot Diet : Seven Deadly Foods

There are many bird diet selections which humans consume that are great for your parrot. However, there are seven foods that can provide deadly to your pet. These are: chocolate, alcohol, avocado, fruits seeds of any type, uncooked eggs, raw meat, or spoiled or moldy foods. There are some other foods over which there is some debate such as onions or garlic cloves. A parrot is extremely unlikely to eat enough of those items to cause a problem.

Healthy Parrot Diet : Parrot Diet Items You Should Limit

There are other human foods which a parrot should have only small amounts included in their bird diet. While a small bit of these foods will not cause harm, allowing the parrot diet to contain large amounts of these can impact the parrot’s health. You will see these foods are also those which healthy humans limit in order to remain at optimum health.

Any food which is high in fat must be limited. Wild parrots diets include very little fat. Think of your parrot diet much as you would the diet of a three year old child. A child could have a few potato chips even though they are high in fact, but you would limit the quantity. In a parrot’s diet, you could allow a bite or even two from the edge of one single potato chip once in a while. Just do not let it become a habit so that every single day the parrot expects and gets potato chips. The golden adage “everything in moderation” is a good guideline to follow about parrot diet items to limit. Examples of foods in this group include: potato chips, fried foods, buttered vegetables or bread, ice cream, and cake or cookies.

Salt is another important item to limit in parrots diets. People should not over-consume salt either, but if you consider how small the parrot body is, you can see what a little salt can be harmful. When cooking any vegetables or other foods, remove a small amount to share with your parrot before adding any seasoning. In this group of foods are: salted meats such as bacon or ham, popcorn with salt, vegetables cooked with salt, and many types of pre-packaged foods such as microwave-ready entrees.

Foods with high sugar are also poor choices for parrots. Diet choices can include very small quantities of added sugar, but use prudence, limiting the parrot to only a bite or two. These foods include items such as: soft drinks with sugar, sweetened cereals, fruit juice with added sugar, cookies, cakes, ice cream, and sugar-coated cereals.

Healthy Parrot Diet : Good Parrot Diet Choices

You may wonder what foods are good to include in your parrot diet. The answer is, basically, everything not listed above! A bird diet should include lots of different foods in order to ensure that a wide range of vitamins and nutrients are consumed. The more choices your parrot diet includes, the better health your parrot will enjoy and the longer life span your companion parrot can expect.

Some of the good foods for parrots’ diets that are really great for parrots are also the foods which are great for health-conscious humans. Vegetables, either raw or lightly cooked are healthy choices. Bits of pasta, cheese, rice, mashed potatoes or boiled potatoes, well-cooked eggs, and bits of well-done meats, poultry, or fish add variety to a bird diet. In fact, many parrots love to chew on a bone from cooked meat and even dig the marrow from the inside of the bone. Let your parrot’s diet include lots of healthy foods.

About the Author

Nora Caterino Mississippi ‘Bird Lady’ finally exposes her proven bird diet.

One of our biggest concerns is how to feed our Greys the most balanced, healthful diets. With the field of avian nutrition being new, especially relative to human nutrition which has been around for nearly one hundred years and with new revelations continuing to pop up almost daily in that field, there is no EXACT formula for feeding our parrots.

A diet that is as organic and preservative/processed food free as possible is best. Also, there needs to be a balance of vegetables/fruits, seeds/nuts/grains and pellets, if you’re not doing the total holistic route of the Mash Diet. A diet that is as varied as possible is best, as a diet that focuses JUST on seed is not nutrient sufficient. In contrast, one that focuses mostly on pellets may also prove to be detrimental, as the synthetic nutrients in them can act more like drugs than nutrients, potentially resulting in physical damage or disease (see “Why Food is Better than Pellets” article in African Grey Facts Section). If you do feed your Grey a pelleted diet, Avian Holistic Health Consultant Alicia McWatters recommends the following general guideline: vegetables 30%; legumes 20%; pellets 20%; seeds/nuts 15%; fruits 10%; and grains 5%. The FACT is that the avian nutrition field is too new and NO ONE knows all the answers, so please look at it conservatively.

Our Greys are individuals with individual dietary needs, so a blood chemistry profile to determine nutritional needs/deficiencies and discussion with a competent avian nutritionist would be beneficial. Please note, however, that when you do get a blood profile on your Grey, make sure the avian veterinarian technician doing it has had sufficient experience because the process can be very traumatic for your parrot. The following is a chart to give you ideas on the nutrient content of various foods:

Be sure to consult your vet or avian nutritional consultant to create an optimal feeding program for your Grey. The following provides an outline of foods “rich” in certain nutrients. The list of nutrients and foods is NOT exhaustive, as the chart is meant only as a guide.

About the Author

Source: Sound Nutrition: the Key to a Healthy Grey By Margaret T. Wright