Why is Maddox washing his food?

[maddox]

So I have begun to notice my GCC Maddox taking his food to his water bowl and dunking it in a few times before eating it. I'm really not sure why he is doing this. My first thought is that he was softening it up but I doubt he is that aware. His food is not overly hard either. I'm not necessarily concerned with this new behavior but more curious. Has anyone else seen this before?

 

[LaManuka]

Although I'm not sure why they do it, it does seem to be a pretty common thing for GCCs to dunk their food before eating. My previous GCC would do it and my cockatiel Fang still does. Not sure to be honest which one of them taught it to whom, but Fang has passed the practice on to Val the budgie too! It may well be just to soften those pellets up a bit, but it's not terribly efficient since Fang seems to drop as much into his water dish as he eats, making the dreaded "pellet soup", meaning I have to refresh their water during the day.

Again, not entirely sure why they do it. It might just be one of those things that falls under the category of "birds are weird"

 

[maddox]

Although I'm not sure why they do it, it does seem to be a pretty common thing for GCCs to dunk their food before eating. My previous GCC would do it and my cockatiel Fang still does. Not sure to be honest which one of them taught it to whom, but Fang has passed the practice on to Val the budgie too! It may well be just to soften those pellets up a bit, but it's not terribly efficient since Fang seems to drop as much into his water dish as he eats, making the dreaded "pellet soup", meaning I have to refresh their water during the day.

Again, not entirely sure why they do it. It might just be one of those things that falls under the category of "birds are weird"

Thanks for sharing! It really does just seem like one of those things.

 

[clark_conure]

No they are that aware.....they like softening their food up sometimes. It's completely normal. It's gravy on the hashbrowns to them.

 

[texsize]

Both my yellow nape and my CAG “make soup “ as we call it.
not everything is dunk worthy.

 

[HeatherG]

It’s a good reason to use a water bottle, but then they’ll press the pellet to the tip and wet it anyhow.