Wild birds spend much of their days foraging for food, consuming a wide variety to meet their nutritional needs. Pet birds also often have complex diet requirements, and consequently many experience health issues due to nutrient deficiencies. One of the most common questions pet bird owners have is whether they should choose seeds or pellets as the base of their birds diet. But the answer isnt so simple.
A Seed Diet
Although many pet birds will happily eat only seeds, this does not necessarily mean that it is healthy for them. Seeds can have a high fat content but deficiencies in numerous essential vitamins and minerals. Additionally, pet bird seed is frequently of very poor quality. A lot of seed mixes are unvarnished, contain artificial coloring, and have other unhealthful ingredients.
A common cause of companion bird mortality is malnutrition associated with an all-seed diet, in addition to a host of other health issues. That is not to say that your bird cannot eat seeds. Seeds can be great treats for a bird. However, they need to be balanced with other elements of a nutritious diet.
What food is toxic to birds?
There are many different foods that birds may find slightly toxic. We’ve compiled a short list of things that will be beneficial to local birds so that you can be sure to feed them only those.
In fact, desiccated coconut is harmful to birds for the same reason that rice is. As part of their production, the grains (or coconut shavings) are dried.
They only slightly grow in your stomach after you eat them, which is something we can manage quite well.
Due to their smaller stomachs, birds may experience severe health problems when switching from dry to fresh coconuts; in rare cases, birds may even die from desiccated coconut.
For similar reasons that they might be bad for you or me, moldy or spoiled food is bad for birds.
You should refrain from giving them to birds because they are highly poor bird food due to the various contaminants and bacteria they contain.
Moldy food frequently appears on lists of foods not to feed wild birds because it’s a straightforward item that most people would discard.
However, if you’ve been feeding birds bad food, you’ve probably been doing them a favor.
Additionally detrimental to visiting birds’ digestive systems are cooking fats. The reason for this is actually a little odd.
Most other animals’ stomachs aren’t quite able to handle the amount of fat that humans’ stomachs are adapted to handle in our diet.
With the exception of fat balls, you should never give our feathered friends fat balls because they can become quite ill and excessive fat can even be fatal.
Although birds love seeds when they’re in the right foods, you shouldn’t give them to them if the seeds are still in the fruit that they grew in.
To ensure their safety, seeds that you purchase and put in a bird feeder have been dried and processed.
Because wild birds are small birds, fresh fruit seeds can pose a choking hazard to them.
You cannot give birds onions, just as you cannot feed them bread. This is because most bird food contains zero sulfur, but onions have a fairly high sulfur content. A small amount of sulfur can be tolerated by the human stomach, but not by the stomach of a bird.
Furthermore, onions are not very nutritious for birds, so even if they could eat them, it might not be a good idea to fill your bird feeders with them.
Similar to how salty foods are generally bad for humans, they can also be harmful to birds. An excessive amount of salt in your diet can cause problems for your heart’s normal operation, which can result in a fairly unhealthy body.
Birds aren’t adapted to consume salt because it’s not a common ingredient in natural food or animal foods found in the wild. Therefore, you should avoid offering saltier food options to birds.
A Pellet Diet
A pet bird’s diet should typically consist of a formulated pellet in addition to fruits and vegetables. This is because the pellets are designed to be a complete, well-balanced meal.
FAQ
Can you eat fish food pellets?
Are pellets better than seeds for birds?
Why won’t my bird eat his pellets?
Can I feed parakeet food to wild birds?