help with a picky eater switching to pellets from seeds

pairofkeets

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Aug 17, 2014
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I adopted a 2nd parakeet about 7 mos. ago. She lives in a separate cage right next to my original parakeet. She seemed fine for a good number of months. When I changed brands of food, she wasn't eating good and loosing weight before I realized that something was wrong. Before this happened, I recently took her to a vet for another problem and he told me that getting them on pellets would be great. I began putting half seed half pellets in her dish. She wouldn't touch them. When I saw how quiet she was and suspected that she was probably quite hungry and seemed thinner I immediately gave her a millet spray to keep her from starving. She returned back to her normal self for now, but I am having a feeding issue. I am trying to offer her a 2nd dish of pellets mixed with a little jam as the vet recommended. She still wont touch it. I bought a different brand of seeds and she isn't crazy about it. I think I need to go back to the brand I had in the beginning, which is a cheaper brand, in order for her to eat more. My question is, does anyone know how to switch a picky eater over to pellets? If I can't succeed she will have to live off the cheap stuff. (no success with my other bird switching to pellets either) Thank you:blue2::yellow2:
 

weco

New member
Nov 24, 2010
3,342
12
USA
Parrots
Nanday, suns, parrotlet, Patagonian
When I had those problems, I'd crush up the pellets & mix with bananas, apple juice, mashed potatoes or anything else they might like, then cut back on their seed mix.....maybe half the original seed offering and in another bowl, the mash offering, leaving both bowls during meal time, then removing both bowls until the next meal time.....the picky nanday I had the problem with took about three months for the change over, you can't do it quick or, as you found out, they might quit eating.....I just kept adding more mashed pellets & less goodie incentive.....

Good luck.....
 

Colorguarder08

Banned
Banned
Mar 8, 2010
604
0
Washington State
Parrots
Riley-white faced grey cockatiel (hatch date 6-28-2014) RIP Halloween-pied cockatiel
Doing a half and half change was probably too dramatic. The crushed up pellets will probably be a better idea. There are some seed brands that have a few pellets in them maybe slowly switch her over to one of those brands then slowly introduce a few more pellets and just keep on slowly adding a few more.
 

RavensGryf

Supporting Member
Jan 19, 2014
14,233
190
College Station, Texas
Parrots
Red Bellied Parrot /
Ruppell's Parrot /
Bronze Winged Pionus /
English Budgie
Why not try weco's idea? Sounds like it might work. Birds seem to like sweet flavored things.
I was lucky with my Budgies. I just put the pellets (Harrison's super fine) in the cage with nothing else to eat (I made sure they didn't starve), and they took to it pretty quickly. It was in their food bowl, so they assumed it was food :)

I lost Pix :(, but Twigs likes pellets so much that he hardly touches seed anymore! :confused: I'd like him to eat more seed since it is a natural part of the Budgie diet in the wild.
 
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pairofkeets

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Aug 17, 2014
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Thank you RavensGryf, weco, and Colorguarder08. I will try a little of each of these ideas. I think I will try bananas instead of jam and put it in the food dish in the morning instead of a second dish. Then after a while I will put in the regular seed, so that maybe they will eventually try a bite of the pellets with food. Wish me luck. Both these guys are afraid of anything new.
 

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