Diet tips for an overweight galah?

[aether-drifter]

I am not sure what Flower weighs, but I KNOW she is a little porkchop! She has "boobs" and feels like a ton of bricks when you pick her up. As far as I know, she was fed a seed-only diet for most of her life thus far. Her current owner says she will eat "some" pellets (need to ask what brand) and veggies, but when I saw her food dish it only had seed in it and a few pieces of fruit she was ignoring.

I know this needs to change ASAP! I'll try making her fresh veggie chop daily, and sprinkling seed and pellets on top. I'm also going to try giving her veggie kabobs, and sprouts. If she is extra stubborn, I might give her a pellet/seed mix for a while, but if she takes to the pellets then I'll probably leave them in her cage all the time, and only use seed as a treat or as a means to get her to try chop and mash.

Any other suggestions? I'm in the US, so I don't have access to native Aussie plants and grasses unfortunately.

And lastly, what is the best brand of pellets for a galah? I know Harrison's is recommended, but none of the birds I've ever cared for would touch it so I'm wary of investing the money. I have plenty of Zupreem cockatiel pellets on hand that I could use (Natural and fruit blend), but I don't know how much more fattening they are than Harrison's. She really does need to lose weight, but obviously giving her healthy food won't do any good if she won't touch it.

She won't be home for another few weeks yet -- just planning ahead!

 

[Jayyj]

Alice was on an all seed diet when I got her, and we've gradually moved across to pellets and veg. She has the Harrisons High Potency Fine pellets, which were pretty easy to get her interested in, and that now makes up half her diet. Veg was a lot harder and is still difficult but she loves boiled sweetcorn and will pick at other bits, and she likes wholegrain pasta and rice two or three times a week. Fruit is still largely off the menu but in the last month or so she's become interested in banana so I've not lost hope yet.

Exercise is great for them if at all possible. It's still a hard one for Alice as although she's fully flighted she's actually quite scared of flying - I think she had some painful crashes when clipped that have put her off. But my long term plan is to get her harness trained and coming outside for exercise.

 

[Betrisher]

Dominic came to us with huge fatty tumours dangling down in front of him. Aside from being dreadfully unsightly, they also impede his movement to a great degree. The vet said he must remain on a strict pellets and veggies only diet, probably for life. As luck would have it, Dom doesn't seem to have any problems with his liver, despite living on sunflower seed for about ten years of his life. It has been roughly twelve months and Dom (who started out weighing 500gm) now weighs about 400gm. Yay! The tumours are still there, but they have shrunk massively. Sadly, like a super-obese person losing weight, Dom will still have the dangling skin left behind. Not yay!

I started by putting a smattering of pellets in Dom's dish over the top of his seed. Being a greedy little piggy, Dom was happy to sample the pellets. I also allowed him to see the Beaks (Alexandrines) eating pellets and that made him even more interested in the different food. It took no longer than a fortnight and Dommie was completely swapped over to a pellets-only diet. Then came the veggies.

I offered Dom a few bits and pieces of this and that, but he turned up his beak at everything. During playtime, I started putting the Beaks' veggie dish on the table where Dommie could get at it. That worked a treat! As soon as the Beaks sidled over to eat some veg, Dom would come a-steaming across the table, wings aloft and crest flying high! First, he would get rid of any foolish long-haired green budgie who tried to eat the veg and then he would positively gobble whatever was in the dish! And that's how I taught Dominic to eat veggies (although, it was really the Beaks who did that).

Now, Dominic will come rushing at me as soon as he sees me open the fridge because he knows his veggies are coming.

The other thing Dom needs is a great deal of exercise and that's the really hard part. With his tumours hanging between his legs, it makes climbing and clambering over things quite difficult. Two great toys we made for him are a cargo net (I've put up a tutorial on how I made it in the 'Toys' section) and a three-foot ladder which my husband made from timber slats and dowel. Dom uses these to climb from his cage-top onto the playgym which is suspended above the cage. Another good toy has been a wire plant-hanger. I bound the edges with cotton rope and throw in all sorts of chewables, from plastic bottle tops to bits of wood from old toys to boxes and packets. This is Dommie's favourite occupation (we call it 'Dominic's Work', since he's a workin' class bird). It's not easy for him to get at the rummage basket: he has to either climb quite a distance to get there, or stretch up and reach with his bill to pull things out from underneath. Dom will stay there rummaging for hours and hours (in fact, he's rummaging right now as I type).

One other thing I do that promotes exercise is to always put Dom down on the kitchen table when I take him from his cage. His favourite place to be is the rummage basket, but he can only get there by flying across the short distance from table to cage-top. In this way, he has to fly two or three times a day and he's getting noticeably better at it. In fact, he went missing last week and I eventually found him on top of the bookshelves in my sewing room preening the tassel on my mortarboard! LOLOLOLOL! I wish I'd gotten a photo! One day, I hope to teach Dom to wear a harness so I can take him outdoors to forage in the backyard. I think that would be the best exercise for him of all!

PS. I can only get one brand of pellets: they're called 'Vetafarm' and they seem to be OK, since all my birds are pretty healthy and in good feather. We danced around like maniacs at the vet's, trying to get Dom to stand on his special scales. When I got home, I asked him to stand on my kitchen scale (which was not cold metal) and he stood stock still. !

PPS. With your veggies, try all sorts of different presentations. My lot prefer their carrot cooked, for example. They're also a lot happier to eat the stalks of broccoli than the florets. Same with cauliflower. They like to eat capsicum (bell pepper), raw pumpkin (but not cooked) and asparagus (fresh, not canned). One thing I have found is that none of them is too fussed on eating fruit. They'll share an apple with me, but won't eat it if I put it in their dish. Bananas are a nightmare! Hubby gave a chunk to Dom yesterday and he wound up with it grouted into his feet! (Dom, not hubby). The only fruit they really, really like is The Magic Pomegranate. They love dried pawpaw too, but I only give that at Home Time - it's my Special Persuader.

 

[strudel]

Flower might naturally eat less when she comes to you. If she was just stuck there with nothing to do, she might have just stuffed her face out of boredom.

I have vetafarm as well, I think they're an australian brand though, so you might not get them there.

Where in the US are you? You might be able to grow stuff that we grow here.

 

[Jayyj]

Betrisher, I could read stories about Dom and the Beaks all day! You should do a book on them along the lines of Georgi Abbott and Pickles, I'd be first in line for a copy!

 

[Betrisher]

LOL! Thanks, Jayyj.

I used to write stories about my adventures with my sister and horses when I belonged to a needlework newsgroup on Usenet, years ago. I reckon animals lend a most unique humour to our lives and enrich them in ways we couldn't have otherwise imagined. My life would be BARREN without animals in it and I only tell the stories of what happens from day to day. Each of us has at least one bird, so each of us has many great stories to tell.

PS. If you'd like to sample my boring stories about horses and the Ugly Sister, they're still kept here: Trish's Boring Stories

Of course, they're not all interesting so you'd have to skip through and pick out the best ones.

 

[Freespin]

I know a lot of birds are more willing to try new foods if they see you (or friends) trying them and enjoying them! You can try having a plate of bird friendly food and eat (or pretend to eat) bits and pieces while burdy is out and generally they will get very curious and demand a taste! You can also roll softer fruits and vege in small amounts of seed to encourage them to try it (banana and cooked pumpkin etc).

As suggested try lots of different presentation! Cooked, raw, grated, diced, chunks etc.

You can also try offering one type at a time to determine what she likes as well as trying to offer a chop mix type thing which you can also mix a small amount of seed in to encourage her to try things.

 

[Freespin]

Also each bird is different so I think the key is just trial and error =)

To try to encourage exercise place bowls and favorite toys all over the cage so she has to go here for some food then go over there for water and then all the way back over there for a fun toy. It works for horsies anyway =p

 

[aether-drifter]

Alice was on an all seed diet when I got her, and we've gradually moved across to pellets and veg. She has the Harrisons High Potency Fine pellets, which were pretty easy to get her interested in, and that now makes up half her diet. Veg was a lot harder and is still difficult but she loves boiled sweetcorn and will pick at other bits, and she likes wholegrain pasta and rice two or three times a week. Fruit is still largely off the menu but in the last month or so she's become interested in banana so I've not lost hope yet.

Exercise is great for them if at all possible. It's still a hard one for Alice as although she's fully flighted she's actually quite scared of flying - I think she had some painful crashes when clipped that have put her off. But my long term plan is to get her harness trained and coming outside for exercise.

Thank you! Hopefully Flower will be like Alice, and take to the pellets quickly at least. I was advised to choose Harrison's lifetime over high potency, due to the high potency having more fat, but I can't imagine they taste much different to the birds.

As for exercise, I think that's going to be just as much of a challenge...I hope she proves me wrong, but I suspect she may be very lazy. Or, I suppose it could be a matter of confidence, as she doesn't seem to know how to fly very well either. I'm buying her a double-wide play stand in the hope that it will encourage her to move around a bit, at least.

How old was Alice when you got her?

Dominic came to us with huge fatty tumours dangling down in front of him. Aside from being dreadfully unsightly, they also impede his movement to a great degree. The vet said he must remain on a strict pellets and veggies only diet, probably for life. As luck would have it, Dom doesn't seem to have any problems with his liver, despite living on sunflower seed for about ten years of his life. It has been roughly twelve months and Dom (who started out weighing 500gm) now weighs about 400gm. Yay! The tumours are still there, but they have shrunk massively. Sadly, like a super-obese person losing weight, Dom will still have the dangling skin left behind. Not yay!

I started by putting a smattering of pellets in Dom's dish over the top of his seed. Being a greedy little piggy, Dom was happy to sample the pellets. I also allowed him to see the Beaks (Alexandrines) eating pellets and that made him even more interested in the different food. It took no longer than a fortnight and Dommie was completely swapped over to a pellets-only diet. Then came the veggies.

I offered Dom a few bits and pieces of this and that, but he turned up his beak at everything. During playtime, I started putting the Beaks' veggie dish on the table where Dommie could get at it. That worked a treat! As soon as the Beaks sidled over to eat some veg, Dom would come a-steaming across the table, wings aloft and crest flying high! First, he would get rid of any foolish long-haired green budgie who tried to eat the veg and then he would positively gobble whatever was in the dish! And that's how I taught Dominic to eat veggies (although, it was really the Beaks who did that).

Now, Dominic will come rushing at me as soon as he sees me open the fridge because he knows his veggies are coming.

The other thing Dom needs is a great deal of exercise and that's the really hard part. With his tumours hanging between his legs, it makes climbing and clambering over things quite difficult. Two great toys we made for him are a cargo net (I've put up a tutorial on how I made it in the 'Toys' section) and a three-foot ladder which my husband made from timber slats and dowel. Dom uses these to climb from his cage-top onto the playgym which is suspended above the cage. Another good toy has been a wire plant-hanger. I bound the edges with cotton rope and throw in all sorts of chewables, from plastic bottle tops to bits of wood from old toys to boxes and packets. This is Dommie's favourite occupation (we call it 'Dominic's Work', since he's a workin' class bird). It's not easy for him to get at the rummage basket: he has to either climb quite a distance to get there, or stretch up and reach with his bill to pull things out from underneath. Dom will stay there rummaging for hours and hours (in fact, he's rummaging right now as I type).

One other thing I do that promotes exercise is to always put Dom down on the kitchen table when I take him from his cage. His favourite place to be is the rummage basket, but he can only get there by flying across the short distance from table to cage-top. In this way, he has to fly two or three times a day and he's getting noticeably better at it. In fact, he went missing last week and I eventually found him on top of the bookshelves in my sewing room preening the tassel on my mortarboard! LOLOLOLOL! I wish I'd gotten a photo! One day, I hope to teach Dom to wear a harness so I can take him outdoors to forage in the backyard. I think that would be the best exercise for him of all!

PS. I can only get one brand of pellets: they're called 'Vetafarm' and they seem to be OK, since all my birds are pretty healthy and in good feather. We danced around like maniacs at the vet's, trying to get Dom to stand on his special scales. When I got home, I asked him to stand on my kitchen scale (which was not cold metal) and he stood stock still. !

PPS. With your veggies, try all sorts of different presentations. My lot prefer their carrot cooked, for example. They're also a lot happier to eat the stalks of broccoli than the florets. Same with cauliflower. They like to eat capsicum (bell pepper), raw pumpkin (but not cooked) and asparagus (fresh, not canned). One thing I have found is that none of them is too fussed on eating fruit. They'll share an apple with me, but won't eat it if I put it in their dish. Bananas are a nightmare! Hubby gave a chunk to Dom yesterday and he wound up with it grouted into his feet! (Dom, not hubby). The only fruit they really, really like is The Magic Pomegranate. They love dried pawpaw too, but I only give that at Home Time - it's my Special Persuader.

Thank you so much for all the advice! I'll try all of your suggestions. As mentioned above, I'm getting her a very large stand, and my plan is to eventually have a climbing net on the wall behind it, so she has one huge play area. I hope seeing my cockatiels fly will also inspire her to move more.

So Dom's tumors don't need to be surgically removed? I'm glad he's lost so much weight, but the poor thing! It's beyond me how people can let an animal's health get so bad without doing anything about it, or even noticing that anything is wrong. Thank goodness he's in your hands now.

Flower might naturally eat less when she comes to you. If she was just stuck there with nothing to do, she might have just stuffed her face out of boredom.

I have vetafarm as well, I think they're an australian brand though, so you might not get them there.

Where in the US are you? You might be able to grow stuff that we grow here.

I'm actually not sure that she overeats...it could just be poor diet coupled with a sedentary lifestyle that's made her so chubby. In any case, very much hoping a diet improvement, larger cage and (hopefully) more exercise will help with that.

I live in Oregon, so right now is a very bad time to be growing things. However, we do get a lot of sun in the summer months, so it's possible I could plant a few things in small pots on my balcony come spring.

I know a lot of birds are more willing to try new foods if they see you (or friends) trying them and enjoying them! You can try having a plate of bird friendly food and eat (or pretend to eat) bits and pieces while burdy is out and generally they will get very curious and demand a taste! You can also roll softer fruits and vege in small amounts of seed to encourage them to try it (banana and cooked pumpkin etc).

As suggested try lots of different presentation! Cooked, raw, grated, diced, chunks etc.

You can also try offering one type at a time to determine what she likes as well as trying to offer a chop mix type thing which you can also mix a small amount of seed in to encourage her to try things.

Also each bird is different so I think the key is just trial and error =)

To try to encourage exercise place bowls and favorite toys all over the cage so she has to go here for some food then go over there for water and then all the way back over there for a fun toy. It works for horsies anyway =p

Good advice, thank you!
The eating things in front of them trick works like a charm on my tiels, so I'll definitely have to try it with Flower.

 

[Freespin]

I dont know how people can let their pets get so over weight and then not do anything about it!! It drives me mental!!! The fattest dog i have ever met wheezes when she breathes, waddles instead of walks and her owners admit she is over weight but dont do anything about it!!!! She gets (at least) a cookie (of the human variety) every morning and doggie treats every time they go out and before bed.

Its such cruelty. "killing them with kindness" kinda thing

 

[aether-drifter]

I must admit, I have an overweight cat and I finally stopped trying with her, because NOTHING I've done has helped. I've tried feeding her less, only leaving the food down for 20 minutes twice a day, switching to weight loss food, etc. It's really hard because I have four other cats, one of whom is borderline underweight and the other is a kitten (so they need to eat a lot more than she does). This year, though, I am going to buy a meat grinder and start making my own cat food. I have a feeling this will help, since it'll be 100% meat without any processed fillers or carbs. In the meantime, though, the vet says she is not dangerously overweight; if it was life-threatening, I definitely wouldn't just sit back and do nothing!

 

[Freespin]

I must admit, I have an overweight cat and I finally stopped trying with her, because NOTHING I've done has helped. I've tried feeding her less, only leaving the food down for 20 minutes twice a day, switching to weight loss food, etc. It's really hard because I have four other cats, one of whom is borderline underweight and the other is a kitten (so they need to eat a lot more than she does). This year, though, I am going to buy a meat grinder and start making my own cat food. I have a feeling this will help, since it'll be 100% meat without any processed fillers or carbs. In the meantime, though, the vet says she is not dangerously overweight; if it was life-threatening, I definitely wouldn't just sit back and do nothing!

Cats are a bit harder, esp when you have multiple cats! At least you have been trying! Cats over here are mostly outdoor cats and they will often find food elsewhere if they feel like it!! Even my partners cat who is well fed and a hunter will go next door for visits and a snack!!

 

[strudel]

I live in Oregon, so right now is a very bad time to be growing things.

Do you have the same climate as California or is it hotter/colder (you get snow up there, don't you)? Basically the climate in California is the same as here, so somebody in California can pretty much grow what I do (subject to availability and local conditions).

"killing them with kindness" kinda thing

I think there's what they call "denial" in there. People are so heavily ingrained with "food equals love" that even though consciously they know they shouldn't keep doling out the tucker, subconsciously they can't help themselves.

 

[aether-drifter]

Oregon is north of California (which is a very big state, with some parts being much warmer than others). It can get fairly cold during the winter where I am (Portland); we don't get much snow much, but it definitely drops below freezing for a few months, especially at night.

 

[strudel]

Yes, I don't think it gets as cold in southern California (that's what I should have said, of course California is enormous). Southern California is the same as here.

 

[aether-drifter]

Southern California would be the ideal climate for having birds! Nice and warm...plenty of opportunity to take the fiddos out for walks...now I'm dreaming.

 

[Betrisher]

Sadly, Dominic's weight problem was caused by my Dad's death and then the early stages of my Mum's dementia. Dad cared meticulously for his birds, but when he died poor Mum had no idea. She just fed Dominic sunflower seeds because 'those are the ones he likes'. At the same time, Mum lost over four stone in weight because she wasn't feeding herself properly either. It was a very sad time for our whole family. Mum wasn't one of those sweet old ladies who enters a gentle dementia: she was an angry, outraged, oppositional old lady who refused help and eventually kicked my sister and me out of the house 'forever'. In the end, we had to go through the laborious and horrible process of having Mum sectioned and effectively kidnapped from her home. You don't ever want to have to do that with your beloved Mother!

The very next day, I kidnapped Dominic from my sister, who had been 'caring' for him in the interim. All I can say is, my sister is an excellent horsewoman - not such an excellent bird carer. People neglect their animals for lots of reasons and some of them, as in the case of my Mum, are innocent and due to awful life circumstances. All we can do is our best and step in where and when we can.

I know of other birds living in awful conditions and I would so love to kidnap them as well. Sadly, I'm not related to their owners and would get nicked by the coppers if I tried. Sigh.

 

[aether-drifter]

I apologize -- I had no idea about your family situation. Removing foot from mouth now. Of course, sometimes it's simply not knowing any better that leads to neglect, not malicious intent or callousness.

 

[strudel]

My little dog got fat and I didn't notice..... His "sister" wasn't well and she wasn't eating her dinners, he was coming in and snaffling her dinner on top of his. I was focused on her and just didn't notice/take in what was happening. After she died, I thought his harness was a bit tight and looked at him and saw he had gone roly-poly. Objectively, it's crazy, how can you not notice your own dog? When you are under stress, things can happen that you don't take in. I've never really had "piggy" animals. One of my cats is big, but he's on a special diet so he eats in isolation. I was also so programmed by the luxury of having had animals who moderated their intake by themselves that I didn't tune in to the weight gain from the extra dinners or see how greedy he was being. I was getting her really nice food to try to tempt her, and he was loving it.

 

[Betrisher]

Oh my dear! No apology is needed! I just wanted to point out that very few people get up with the idea each morning that they'll do the worst they can by their fellow man or beast. Most of the dreadful situations we hear of are born of ignorance or misfortune, not malice. I learned this a long time ago when I was working with at-risk children. A wise old nun told me 'Very few parents get out of bed each day and ask themselves how they can best ruin their children's lives: it just happens.'