Converting Hoodeds to Pellets

[Gerard]

Hi Experts,

Any advice for converting my Hooded Parrots from seed to pellets? I've tried rissoles, I've tried pancakes. I've spent about 4 weeks trying to get them to take the pellets, but they simply pull them apart to get at the seeds and the pellets are left. They will also eat virtually any vegie, but not interested in fruit of any description. Does anyone know of a company that manufactures a vegetable flavoured pellet? The last trick I'm going to try is boiling a bag of corn for several hours and then spray the liquid over the pellets to see if that has any effect. The pellets I'm using are Vetafarm Nutriblend Mini Pellets.

Thanks,
Gerard.

[vankarhi]

eating seed is not that bad for them especially if they are eating plenty of veges. I don't know anything about hooded parrots but I know that some birds do not eat fruit or a not normally known to eat fruit or veges. When I was researching RTB2's I had read that they can survive quite well on a diet of sunflower seeds and nuts........and I give my guy heaps of nuts and sunflower seeds, I also make up sprouts for him and I offer fruit and veges.........so far he does try some veges, a little fruit but not much of them but does LOVE snow peas.

I dont know how old your hoodeds are but if they are eating heaps of veges.........I would consider that ok as long as they are eating a good variety of veges like with green leafy veges and maybe brocoli, carrots.......the list goes on.

But if you really would like them to eat pellets also, I would do a mix of 50/50 approx of seed and pellet mix and see how they go with that, slowly trying to introduce more pellets...........but making sure they are actually eating the pellets too.

You could try to sprout the seeds or try making some sprouts of other types and give them that too

[vankarhi]

oh and I tried nutriblend pellets on my guys a couple of years ago..........and I didn't like the smell of them, sort of sickly sweet so I never bought them again. I like using veta farm parrot maintenance or Roudybush ..... if you can get roudybush pellets?? At the moment I bought some big pellets for my RTB2 and the brand is Hagen.........I wont be buying them again either.........they smell sweet to me too, but up here it is hard sometimes to buy exactly what I want so I will have to look online I think.

[Gerard]

Thanks Vankarhi, but I haven't given up the ghost yet. I have contacted Vetafarm to find out if they manufacture a non-fruit flavoured pellet. For the moment, I have put them back onto the Avi-Grain budgie mix. For assorted greens I will cut a slice of apple into 2 and divide up a small metal feed dish into 4 with it. One section may have corn kernels, another peas, another sprouts, celery, etc. They will at least try anything. In fact, bok choy is one of their favourites. As for a quick insight into Hooded Parrots (Psephotus dissimilis) I just think we are very lucky in this country to have such beautiful native birds. All our Psephotus parrots have a wonderful call that lacks the earsplitting screeches that we all tend to associate with parrots generally. However, they are very aggressive and no other birds should share their confines or blood will be spilt. The cock's initial threat display is to extend himself as far as he can horizontally along the perch and raise his wings slightly without unfolding them and sort of looks like an arrow that is about to be fired. If this threat fails then the feathers come up like the hackles on a dog and he stands as tall as he can to look as big as possible. If that fails, then it's war, as one poor wild Red Rump that now has one less toe found out we he landed on their mobile aviary while it was outside. For this reason he was named Hototo - Native North American for Warrior Spirit who sings. The hens are far more gentle and tend to call more. Hence she was named Chiku - African for Chatterer. Once I have their diet sorted, I'll put them into training.

As for your RTB2, definitely a feathered demolition machine. We had a flock of about 50 of them move into the outer-eastern suburbs of Melbourne after the bushfires several years ago and what they could do to a hard green pinecone in a minute, you and I couldn't do it with a hammer and chisel. Stunning birds though, with bucketloads of character. Have lots of fun with him.

Gerard.

[Gerard]

Vankarhi, you should definitely go online to source your pellets and other dietary supplements for your birds. Actually, I think I should start a new thread on this. Stay tuned.

[Robyn]

I think your doing a good job getting them to eat the variety of foods your already offering. Persistence pays off in the end. But some birds just will not eat pellets at all.

Vetafarm do have a good range of pellets these days. The maintence pellets Tracey mentenioned & the Breeder Pellets that i sometimes use are not fruit flavoured.

Good luck breeding your birds.

[Gerard]

Thanks Robyn, but I really haven't decided whether I'll breed them or not yet. Their breeding season is in the middle of a Melbourne winter, so it's a whole different kettle of fish breeding Hoodeds compared to the scarlets. With the scarlets you strapped a nest box on the side of the mobile aviary, or cage, as it was in the early days and away they went. Your climate in Cairns is far more suitable for breeding them. What does your flock consist of?

[Robyn]

I don't think any parrot is that hard to breed as long as you have a compatible pair & they are healthy.

I don't feed any of my parrots a lot of pellets. I do however mix a few in with their dry seed. I much prefer a more fresh way of feeding my birds & to this day i really don't think the be all or end all is pellets. But each to their own.

I have a few different species of conures, BF Amazons, Hahn's Macaw, Eclectus, Major Mitchells. SC Too, Alexandrine, budgies & tiels. Although I have had just about every Australian Parrot over the years. I have now settled on the birds i really like.

Been through the grass parrot stage.

[avinet]

I wouldn't get too worried about converting Hooded to pellets. Local breeders here found them to be very easy to breed on a seed, vegies and fruit diet - so much so in fact that in the last 5 years most stopped breeding them since they couldn't sell the babies. I was able to buy them in at $25 a young pair, sell at $45 a pair - and even at that price they were slow sellers.

Twenty years ago they were considered a very difficult bird to breed, but succeeding generations have become easier and easier - as they effectively became domesticated.

If they continue on a seed based diet my only suggestion is to give them once a week a multivitamin supplement in their drinking water - Vetafarm's Soluvet is a good one - check expiry date! That acts as a safety net in case the mix of foods they are eating is lacking in a particular vitamin or mineral. If they look like breeding then some Calcivet (since they are inside) 3 times a week up to egg laying and through to babies weaning would be worth doing.

If you do want to move to pellets then get Roudybush pellets for them - the mini size is best. They are far far better quality than Vetafarm - in fact Vetafarm pellets are in my opinion little better than a seed diet. Roudybush are quite a bit more expensive but you get what you pay for - and it is worth the expense. We sold 5 brands of pellets in our shop and Roudybush was the best - followed by Kaytees, then Pretty Bird, Passwell and finally Vetafarm.

I gave my African Greys Roudybush pellets for near 4 years and they were in excellent feather. I swapped them onto Vetafarm last year because of cost (after our business failed we have to survive on the aged pension only - with 25 pet birds, an aviary full of retired birds, 3 cats and a dog to feed!) and the female Grey started plucking. Now it is a habit that is proving very difficult to break - might not have been the change in pellets but it was very coincidental, and nothing else changed at that time.

As a general rule for swapping birds to pellets - and I note you are already using the mini size Gerard so this is a general comment to anyone reading this thread - I always found it much easier if the pellets were about the same size as the seed they were used to eating. Most customers wanted to buy the larger pellets - the ones 3 or 4 mm in diameter. The birds don't seem to recognize something this size as possible food, whereas the smaller pellets - more seed sized - are likely to be tried. And there is less wastage with the smaller pellets - less crumbling occurs and more gets swallowed. Vetafarm especially is a problem with pellets crumbling up to powder and half the stuff is wasted. Have a look at www.vetafarm.com.au/categories/BIRDS/FOODS/ and scan down to the two images of the Nutriblend pellets to see what I mean about size.

cheers,

Mike

[anzac]

As always thanks for the great info Mike. Bugger I just bought 2kg of the Vetafarm pellets and I normally buy Passwell ones For my turks, I mix the seed to pellet 1/2 to 1/2 as they are aviary birds and they seem to eat them. Is Vetafarm that bad Mike, should I use the Vetafarm bag up or just chuck it out and buy some more Passwell's?

[avinet]

It's not that Vetafarm is necessarily bad, but the other brands in my opinion are better. Vetafarm is better than no pellets, and your 50/50 mix isn't a bad way to go with the Turks you have. While I rate Passwell over Vetafarm I don't think there is much difference between them. It is more a reflection of the two companies and their reputations. Further comment would have to go to PM.

cheers,

Mike

[mango]

On the topic of Roudybush, is there anywhere local where we can source these pellets?

[Gerard]

Thanks for the input as always Mike. Yes, the size of the pellet versus the size of the seed was one of the reasons I gave them a go. Vankarhi also suggested Roudybush so I will give that a go. It wasn't all wasted effort though as they will now eat a bit of the apple slices I use to divide the dish up into 4 quadrants. I try to put different things in there all the time to find out what they will and won't eat. There will be a little trial and error here, but it's all part of the fun of having a new species of bird. ;D

When did your fascination with birds begin and what was your first bird?

[Gerard]

Anzac, how long have you had the Turks? I had Scarlets before getting these. The best daily fun I always had with the Scarlets was when I let them out of the mobile aviary to fly around the house...or at least that was the theory. They would always have an initial fly around (I never clipped their wings) before landing on the floor. For them the fun was running around everywhere...and boy could they run mighty fast for a little bird with little legs. Like mice.

[Gerard]

Mango, I have no idea...yet. The only ones I saw in the shops were Wombaroo and Vetafarm. No one in the eastern suburbs of Melbourne has it, so I'll do a little digging...on-line...sorry Mike.

[avinet]

If you have a Petstock store near you it may have Roudybush - they are the only local store to me that have it in stock. You could try calling the importer at 07 4697 3953 and ask them the name of a local supplier to you.

However if you don't have a local shop you have my permission to buy on-line www.brookfieldproduce.com.au/bird-1/Food/roudybush is one store that sells on-line but I don't know if they are the cheapest. You are looking to buy the Mainenance Pellets, mini size. I use the mini size even for my Greys, I find there is much less wastage with the smaller size pellet.

cheers,

Mike

[avinet]

Feb 20, 2012 17:46:38 GMT 10 Gerard said:

When did your fascination with birds begin and what was your first bird?

Our first birds were the traditional budgie and cockatiels, a lot of years ago. We started selling them in 1991 but when I think back we were real novices back then. In those pre-Internet days the best way to learn was through a club and we learnt a tremendous amount very quickly by talking and visiting avicuturists and going to all the meetings we could. Both my wife and myself have science Ph.D.'s so researching and learning came easily.

We currently have 25 birds living as pets in the house, from elderly cockatiels (the oldest over 20 years old) to a pair of African Greys. We have kept at various times around 15 different species as pets, and my hand rearing count is around 40 different species.

cheers,

Mike

[Gerard]

Mango, you can acquire Roudybush Pellets from Brookfield Produce & Pet Pavilion in Queensland. I couldn't easily find someone who sells this product retail in NSW of VIC. That's not to say there isn't one, I just couldn't readily see one. About $55 a 10 pound bag. Roudybush advise not to provide any other supplements while on this diet, including any grit. A small amount of fruit and veg is OK, but essentially it is a complete diet. Hope this helps.

I also came across some old threads and posts from this forum on this very subject from 2005-2007 while doing the search. It was quite a vigorous, emotional and lively debate among the members back then...and I thought my other thread might have stirred the masses a bit. It has nothing on the pellet v seed diet threads back then. I can see the pros and cons of both sides, but the one thing that does stick out, is that if I can't get my Hoodeds onto pellets, it's not as though it's disaster or anything.

[Gerard]

Thanks Mike, you beat me to it.

[anzac]

Feb 20, 2012 18:03:22 GMT 10 Gerard said:

Anzac, how long have you had the Turks? I had Scarlets before getting these. The best daily fun I always had with the Scarlets was when I let them out of the mobile aviary to fly around the house...or at least that was the theory. They would always have an initial fly around (I never clipped their wings) before landing on the floor. For them the fun was running around everywhere...and boy could they run mighty fast for a little bird with little legs. Like mice.

I have had the turks for about a year now and hence why I joined here to get some valuable advice which I have had, with thanks mostly from Mike and Greg. I had bourkes many moons ago but saw an ad for a turk on Gumtree and hence Anzac came along (and my user name). Unfortunately Anzac died shortly after I bought him so I bought a pair of turks and a separate aviary and they have had 2 clutches this year. I'll be taking out the nesting box soon as I don't won't them having too many clutches as they have successfully raised 6 babies this year. Leanne