My mom was given a peach faced lovebird last night and I've been looking up what to feed the darling and it said that seeds should only be 10-25% of thier diet, and it recommends using pellets as the other percentage of their diet. well as we all know those pellets are cooked and the bird wouldnt be cooking its food had it not been captured and brought here, SO if anyone knows foods to feet the bird so it is not nutritionally deficent, i'd love some tips... thanks

Hey - I wish I knew too.

We've had a female lovebird, called a Dutch blue, and she has a peach face.

We've been giving her Harrisons for a long time and supplementing with orange-coloured fruits and vegs (for vitamin A).

I want to switch to an all raw diet for her - but I'm afraid of malnourishing her since birds don't show illess tilljust before they're about to die.

She's seen the local aviary expert, who recommened this diet but this vet is one of the least healthy looking people Ive ever seen.


I guess I could read the ingredients off the Harrisonspackage and give her those things in raw form.


Hmmmm....

their wild diet is predominantly acicia seeds, followed by other seeds, nuts, fruits, veggies, cereal grains ... so i would suggest finding those and trying that

for my own birds they get a standard seed mix (store bought is probably not raw or organic) for their breed, and all the fruit and veggies they want .. i put in anything once or twice and see if they like it

my cockateils pretty much eat any fruit of veggies i put in there as well as seeds and nuts

if you provide a huge variety its doubtfull they will get malnutrition

...Jodi, the banana eating buddhist




Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/05/2007 05:51PM by Jgunn.

I have had 2 fischer lovebirds for over a year now. I sprout for them. They love sprouted wheat and adzuki beans! And they like sprouted lentils and mung too.

I have gradually moved away from dry seeds and pellets, but not too fast because they didn't know what fresh food was when I got them.
It is my understanding, according to our local parrot rescue phoenixlanding.org, that lovebirds in particular need 40% grains.

Other than sprouts, I give them a little bit of whatever I am cutting up for myself, whether cabbage, kale (they love kale!), cucumbers, apple (another favorite), and the list goes on.

At this point they share 1-2 Tb of seed/pellets a day and about 1/4 cup of sprouts (a lot of the sprout gets wasted) and 1-2 Tb of produce, plus I may add a big chunk of apple or something for them to nibble on.

Not sure if you know this already, but it can take a while to introduce a new food to a bird. It helps to eat the food in front of them, and also to keep putting a little of it in their dish for several days. Eventually they will try it.

My lovebird doesn't like fruit very much. I've tried pushing mangos and papaya, etc - all kinds of orange fruit on her.

I started giving her red and orange peppers, then raw yams.....well she clearly loves the yams most of all the raw things I've given her.

I don't know if she dislikes the sweetness of the fruit or the stickiness and
mushiness it produces on her beak.

I've been eating lots of raw yams and they're quite sweet, crunchy and juicy much of the time - just to say that they seem like a good food for her.

I have been afraid to give her sprouts and to experiment with her. Randomly, I will read or be told that this or that is poisonous to parrots, etc, and I don't know what to believe, so I don't store this info. I decided to play it safe with the premade stuff - at least it says it's organic.

I feel guilty not feeding her an all-raw diet, because of my beliefs and because our dog has been all-raw since the day we got her. But one of the main ingredients in her pellets is corn - I couldn't get raw corn for her most of the year and perhaps she needs this.

I also feel guilty about not giving her raw foods more often, but she just wasn't nibbling on them - till the yams.

I have been to a few seminars hosted by phoenixlanding.org regarding the care of parrots. One in particular was 'cooking' for your bird. So I feel very comfortable with the information I received. I have met the people in the organization and know they care for their birds and are advocates for those without proper care.

There are a few reasons that sprouts are good for birds. First, you know that the nutrition is high. Next, it is likely that they eat sprouted seeds in the wild since lovebirds eat off the ground and some of the seeds on the ground start germinating. And finally, sprouts are a fresh food that you can leave in their cage for hours, not worrying about spoilage like other foods, because they are 'still growing'!

aquadecoco - If you are interested in increasing the rawness of your bird's diet, then you have made the right beginning! You experimented and found a raw food that your lovebird likes. Another highly recommended food for lovebirds is kale. If you eat this yourself, you can cut up a little bit each time for you bird. It can take as much as offering for 3 weeks! You can also try different parts of a plant. As an example, I found that mine love it when I cut up the stems of parsley. That is a really easy thing to prepare for them.

You have made me more mindful of providing orange foods. I would like to try the yams when I get some. In the meantime I gave them some carrots which I forgot that they enjoyed. They are a bit bitter this time of year so I have not been eating them myself.

I found getting my birds to eat more fresh food to be a slow and grueling process at first. But at one of the seminars about training, it was explained that to change their behavior we must take a lot of tiny steps toward the goal. And you will get there. Getting my cats to go raw has been a lot simpler and quicker!

Also, you mentioned corn. I am not sure how much time you take preparing foods, but one solution is to buy corn in season, cut it off the cob and dry it in the dehydrator. My lovebirds like to eat these tasty morsels.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 09/08/2007 08:58PM by lovebird.

Thanks, those are great ideas.

Now I know sprouts are okay, I'll give her some.

I didn't know they were slow to change their diets.

hi, i hope i can help, i've had birds for over 10 years. a "dutch blue" peach face love bird, and kinda bred them, didn't mean too, we got a pair and who knew? so then we had babies, and babies and babies.. before i got rid of the mating pair, in the last clutch were babies of a gray/olivegreen, violet color. we kept one of those and called him igor. anyway, yes, you can buy pellets for love birds at petsmart, or on line at drsfosterand smith. and add the pellets gradually, birds are very wary of new things, we raised our first love bird on pellets, sohe just ate them all the time. but the other birds we got had to be weaned off of seeds. i think there are directions on the bag of pellets, for the first week add 3 parts seed to 1 part pellets, then the 2nd week it's 2 and 2 etc.. but watch him carefully, be sure he is eating the pellets not just throwing them out of his seed dish.. he would probably put them in the water dish, so ithink that's a good sign.also fruit and veggies, stay away from apple seeds,and becareful, teflon pans and pots if cooking on them, and they burn, the odor they cause, that we cannot smell, will deffinetly kill the bird, also self cleaning ovens.don't use or be sure the bird is not in the home for a day..my love bird loves carrots, broccoli, and blackberries and rasberries and you might try some bananas, also past is quite good. lola

lovebird - thanks, yes I started giving her parsley and kale stems and she loves them - gives her an activity too.

Do you talk to your birds.....teach them words?

My dog and lovebird both love to know words. I tell the bird the name of the food I'm giving her. Then I'll ask her if she'd like some yam or kale, or whatever, but I don't speak lovebird so I rarely understand her. We used to communicate much better until she matured, around age 2-3, then she lost her focus on people and turned to nesting, mating, protecting her 'nest', types of behaviour. I've been told she'll get past that when she's older and mellow out.