In europe and can't find a decent pellet food - help!

[Rei]

Hi everyone - new here.

So I moved to Iceland nearly two years ago - along with my household supplies was a big sealed container of Lafaber daily diet parrots, which my amazon has eaten since he was weaned. They're getting quite low now, so I finally got around to looking to getting more. All the stuff in stores looked awful (and was in small quantities too boot), largely seed-heavy mixes or just jumbles of dried fruit and veggies which he'd pick out his favorites out of and not eat the rest. There wasn't a single pellet mix.

No problem, I thought, I'll just buy from the US in bulk, ship in through a reshipper (ShopUSA), and no problem. Except that it was blocked by the Food and Veternary Authority because it contains dried eggs, and even if it didn't contain dried egg, I'd still have to get the company registered as a feed supplier, and the application process requires, among other things, a complete rundown of the source of all ingredients and their approval numbers for sale within the European Union. In short, it's impossible to import parrot food from the US.

So I tried browsing through Amazon.co.uk. And the options there were, like the options, here, well, to be blunt... crap. See for yourself:

[ame="http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=sr_nr_p_n_feature_keywords_10?rh=n%3A340840031%2Cn%3A451108031%2Cn%3A2110329031%2Ck%3Aparrot+food%2Cp_n_feature_keywords_two_browse-bin%3A2716648031|2716647031|2716649031|2716651031|2716652031|2716646031|2716645031|2716644031|2716643031|2716642031&sort=price-asc-rank&keywords=parrot+food&ie=UTF8&qid=1393278077&rnid=2716631031"]Amazon.co.uk: parrot food - Weight: 10 selected / Food / Birds: Pet Supplies Store[/ame]

Seeds, seeds, seeds, jumbles, seeds, jumbles, jumbles, seeds... no pellet base diet.

The option that my mind keeps coming back to is switching to making a food for him... but the more I think about that the more it makes my head hurt, how much time I know it'd take, how often, and that's assuming I could figure out how to make something he'd actually enjoy in the first place. I don't have that kind of time to take up a new project like that.

So what should I do?

 

[SandyBee]

I just tried your link and did a search on parrot food, they have Harrison's and pretty Bird and some Lafaber products. Can you order from them?

 

[MikeyTN]

Zupreem pops up too....is there a shipping problem that we don't know about?

 

[Rei]

Okay, this is strange... none of that was coming up before. Perhaps the problem was that I had a weight restriction - even though I checked every box over a certain weight, it seems a lot of the stuff that's listed in pounds just doesn't come up if you have any sort of weight restriction even if falls into the range you select.

Okay, well, then that leads to the next issue. They have "some lafeber products" but not the pellets. So I have to switch brands. What all would you recommend?

As sort of an off topic, he's probably the most famous parrot in Iceland because I take him everywhere. Here he is in the Of Monsters and Men official music video for Mountain Sound, for example (0:38): http://vimeo.com/49418306 - at their next concert I took him to, when the lead singer saw him, she had the whole crowd of 30,000 people applaud him.

 

[Rei]

Dang.... I tried Harrison's, Zupreem, and Kaytee, and each time I got a message that they cannot deliver to me... I guess they won't ship to Iceland. And I don't know of a UK reshipper like I do for America.

So I'm back to square one. Any ideas?

 

[MikeyTN]

Wow....there's not much selection or places to buy parrot products.
The following is all I can find.
www.petmanufacturers.com

Dr Harvey's is expensive but it's actually quite healthy food for birds.

 

[Kiwibird]

We feed Kiwi Volkmans soak and serve mix as his staple diet food (as opposed to pellets or seeds). Doubtful you can get it imported, but you can buy every single ingredient in it at any supermarket wherever you are in the world-

Soybeans, Brown Paddy Rice, Bean Mix (Trapper Peas, Pinto Beans, White Northern Beans, Small Red Beans, Baby Green Lima Beans, Blackeye Peas, Red Kidney Beans, Black Turtle Beans, Alaskan Green Peas), Wheat, Popcorn, Oat Groats, Pearl Barley, Small Yellow Corn, White Corn, Buckwheat, Red Lentils, Split Green Peas, Split Yellow Peas and Common Lentils.

You just cook them up, and if you make up a big batch, it will keep in the fridge for a few days. It's a lot healthier than seeds or pellets and can be made at home.

 

[Frumpydumple]

If you want to buy from the UK I get Harrisons pellets from Parrot Supplies | Parrot Shop | Parrot Accessories – Northern Parrots they have loads of different pellet brands too. Or you could try eBay.

 

[Rei]

Thanks, Frumpydumple, that's perfect - they ship to Iceland!

Finally, something with decent nutrition for him that I can buy here! Hopefully he won't mind the small change. Thankfully amazons can be sort of little piggies, I'm sure it'll be fine