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Seed eaters [ Web link ...]
- Largest and most popular cage and aviary birds are seed eaters.
- These birds live mainly on seeds, but also eat fruit, insects, egg food and green food.
- Fruit and green food contain a lot of important nutrient, but too much of these will give rise to problem such as diarrhea.
- Green feed is good during breeding season.
- During breeding season, seed eaters should be introduced with insects and worms so that they will recognize the feed and feed their young with insects and worms.
- Egg food, is an important dietary supplement for most seed eaters.
- This food has proven to be very valuable especially in the period leading up the breeding time as well as during and after the breeding time too.
- The bird’s main diet should consist of its seed mix supplemented with some green food, insects, and egg food to avoid deficiency.
Fruit, vegetable, berries and weeds
- Most birds eat some form of green food. For some them it is an essential ingredient of their diet and for others it is a supplement.
- The main problem with this is contamination with dust, fumes and pesticides.
- Example of suitable fruits and vegetables are apple, pears, bananas, grapes, orange segments, mandarins, papays, dates, apricots, pineapples, carrots, tomatoes, corncobs.
- Never feed the birds avocados as these are poisonous for a lot of birds. Black berries, raspberries, rose hips and fire thorn berries and also suitable to feed them.
Insects and worms
- Not all live food is suitable for all the insect eating species of birds.
- The weaker species of insects are more suitable for small and younger birds.
- Example of suitable insects and other animal proteins for aviary birds are : crickets, grasshoppers, bugs, spiders, meal worms, buffalo worms, maggots, fruit flies, aphids, Nealy bugs, earthworms, mosquito larvae, water fleas.
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