Quality Cuttlebones? Do they Exist?

[Tweedles]

My Cinnamon Cockatiel Tweedles loves his cuttlebones and will run right over when I put a new one in. He also has a calcium block and uses them both.


I know cuttlebones are not very expensive, but it seems as if they ALL are cheap junk. My local pet store rarely has them in stock and so I have to buy them online. They often arrive cracked or broken, and often the cheap little wire has to be re-inserted to hold the bone properly in the cage.

I don't mind paying more for a QUALITY product if such a thing exists.

Can you recommend a certain brand you and your bird(s) like that isn't cheap junk?

Tweedles thanks you.

 

[bug_n_flock]

Honestly?

I think it's another thing we humans have royally messed up on.

When I was a teenager working in the parrot shop my boss would buy big boxes of *nice* big healthy chunky solid cuttlebones and she would sell them for something like 3 for 5$ or something like that, they were very affordable.

In the 20 some odd years since then, I find fewer and fewer of them and they are all the teeny tiny crappy ones you are describing.

Just a guess based on zero research but I think we overdid it with cuttlefish harvesting, and there's just not as many high quality animals in the sea yielding fewer high quality cuttlebones

 

[DonnaBudgie]

Are the smaller ones inferior or just smaller?

 

[rheashard2]

My CAG hit puberty and was making my life miserable. I went through a phase where I thought she would start laying eggs. I looked into cuttle bone. Large pieces of the stuff used to be everywhere from discount to petstores. I saw it wasn't carried much anymore. I wondered if it was out of fashion. I looked on line. The sites I found carrying and recommending it are thinly veiled advertising. With the pollution, over fishing and global warming I worried about the supply and quality. Maybe its a combination of factors. My desire for information had me do another search. I found this disclaimer.

 

[DonnaBudgie]

Does it really matter how big they are?