Golden rules for converting to pellets (part 2)

"Dr. Patrick"

DR. PATRICK GHYSELS

  • 38 years as an avian vet, specialised in birds
  • 50 years of keeping and breeding birds, but above all bird lover
Golden rules for converting to pellets:
  • There are also a number of things that can be done to encourage a pet bird to eat the new food. At first, this can be done by moistening the food a little so that it becomes a little softer; perhaps even moistening it with a little honey or fruit juice, something sweet that they like. Then many birds will learn to eat it faster and you can leave out the flavouring afterwards, once they are eating it well.
  • Young birds that you have bred yourself can also be accustomed very well by adding moistened pellets to the egg food that is given to the older birds. These moistened pellets are soft. The older birds, which are used to pellets, will feed this to the young birds. So the young birds will eat the pellets automatically and spontaneously. And when they reach weaning age - the age when they have to learn to eat on their own - they will eat the pellets much more easily than they would eat seeds. Because they pick up the pellets and they get their nutrition right away. Seeds they first have to learn to peel, this requires a much more difficult operation for those young birds, before they get the nutrient. So a young bird will always learn to eat pellets very easily.
  • Pet birds who are used to getting a snack out of your hand, can sometimes learn to eat it with a game. Instead of the traditional nut or snack you offer, you can also offer a pellet and teach the bird for a few weeks that the pellet is a snack, before you give it as food. And then the bird will think: "Oh, this is interesting. Today I only get snacks in my bowl." And so you can teach him to eat that.
These are all little tricks that can speed up and simplify your conversion to pellets. This will work for one bird, and this will work for another. I would say: try it out. And see where it takes you, but above all: observe your birds closely while you are converting and see what they think of it.

How to convert your birds to pellets?

Making the switch to extruded pellets is an excellent way to keep your birds in top condition. It’s also easy. Just follow our step-by-step guide to help your birds switch to eating pellets. Additionally we give you some tips.


Start converting to pellets

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