weaning Pyro

I will give a little history, although some of you may know this from previous posts. I have had Pyro for 5 weeks now and he is 15 weeks old. When I got him from the breeder he was only 10 weeks old. I was told by the breeder that he was down to 1 feeding a day, but I think the stress of moving caused him to regress a little and he was requiring 3 feedings a day of about 1 1/2 teaspoons. I took him to the vet a few days after I got him and she wanted me to feed him 4 times a day but never more than 1 syringe (1 teaspoon) at a time. I think she was worried about crop stretching. Anyways Pyro didn't really let me feed him 4 times a day for very long. It wasn't even a week and he was down to 3 times a day again. Every time I gave him formula it was very obvious that was what he wanted. He used to do the head bobs and loud screams when he was hungry for formula. When I gave it to him he would flap his wings and make chirping noises all while bobbing his head insanely fast. He would let me squirt the formula right down his throat. So things have changed in the past week and I think he is weaning. He only takes a half syringe 1-2 times a day and he doesnt head bob anymore. He doesn't even flap his wings and chirp when I give it to him and he only lets me put a small amount in his beak at a time. He mulls it around with his tongue and swallows it, but he isn't very enthusiastic about it at all. I really think he is almost weaned but this scares me so much. I've never weaned a bird before and I'm so worried that he wont eat enough. His crop never seems full like it would be right after a formula feeding. How do I really know that he is eating enough and what is enough?

I have never weaned one either but a diet conversion is similar enough possibly. The biggest thing that I would suggest is to get a gram scale and weigh him once or twice daily and keep record of it. Don't be too concerned about a fluctuation in weight that seems excessively large. My two blue crowns can go up and down quite a bit in a week. I've seen an occasional swing of 10 grams. Seems like a lot for a 180 gram bird. But the next day the weight would come back.

Also, keep an eye on the droppings. Make sure that they stay an average size.

Share meals with your bird. Make a big fuss about eating good things and offer him some. Or pretend to not want to share something if he is reluctant to eat it. I've seen that drive a bird nuts and he just HAD to have whatever it was that he did not want to eat to begin with.

IF he's hungry, he'll beg for more food! Why is your vet worry about crop stretching? They shrink as they grow older. As they take lesser and lesser formula and once they start to eat on their own, it's shrunken down pretty good. I feed my babies as much as they want cause they will tell me once they've had enough. Have you placed weaning food within the cage for the baby yet? He should start playing and trying to eat them right now.

MikeyTN said:

IF he's hungry, he'll beg for more food! Why is your vet worry about crop stretching? They shrink as they grow older. As they take lesser and lesser formula and once they start to eat on their own, it's shrunken down pretty good. I feed my babies as much as they want cause they will tell me once they've had enough. Have you placed weaning food within the cage for the baby yet? He should start playing and trying to eat them right now.

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Im not sure what you mean by "weaning food." He eats two different types of pellets that I mix together. The pellets are Zupreem fruit blend and Harrisons, which was a vet recommendation. I also chop up some nuts for him in the morning because he doesn't have the beak strength to open the shells. I give him some seeds for treats and he has millet spray in his cage. He eats very little human food and its mostly grains. I'm still working on that with him. I'm pretty sure it was crop stretching that she was worried about because she didn't want me to feed him as much as I was giving him. It was hard to scale back at the time because I new he wanted more than I was giving him.