I’m sure like most people, you go to the Pet store or local big box store & grab a bag of seed for your Parakeet (Also called Budgies) & feel this is a good option. I did the same thing till I researched the ingredients in manufactured seed mixes. I had been to my Vet with a bird (think it was a foster bird-a Conure) & she had me bring the bag of what I was feeding. She looked at the ingredients & was telling me things were not good for birds or even toxic. I wish I had recorded her because she gave so much detail it was a bit overwhelming, but it made me go home & think about it. A couple weeks later I was still thinking about it, so decided I needed to look into it & was shocked at what I found out. I spend about 3 weeks in my spare time going through ingredients in every brand of food I could find when I Google searched for bird food. I found the ingredients & wrote them down & then looked them up, of course I knew what the seeds were, but had no idea what some of the other ingredients were. It turned out there were so many artificial & chemical things added, along with sugars & salts. I also researched the side effects of these chemicals & additives & was shocked that it was legal to put many of these in pet food, but it’s not legal to put them in human consumable products. Animals are considered property in the eyes of the laws where I live & they are not regulated as well as they should be, so the buyer needs to beware. I also believe we need to educate ourselves, but if you don’t want to research it yourself, you can email me & I can send you the document I wrote after all my research. It is about 10 page long & very in-debt but it will help you to realize 99% of the bird seed sold out there has ingredients that you nor your bird should consume. If you’re thinking, I feed a pelleted diet not seeds so my birds are good, sorry to say, but I researched pelleted diets as well. They contain many artificial ingredients, dyes & chemicals as well, plus pellets are made from ground seeds, so why not let them eat what they would crack open & eat in the wild. I think someone convinced people pellets were healthier, I think it really was that they are less messy & if your bird would eat them then less waste. I fed them for a while & I would find a pile of dust/powdered pellets in the bowl from them grinding them up with their beaks, so less waste wasn’t the case for me.
One thing that surprised me was when I sent the document to my Vet was she said I forgot a side effect of one common chemical in seed mixes. The side effect was aggression, yes it can cause aggression in birds. I had read about potential side effects such as anxiety, restlessness, fear & agitation. It got me to thinking about two foster Parakeets I had that had been with me for about 2 years & were overlooked by a number of people upon meeting them. The moment someone, even me entered the room they were in, they would start flying or jumping around & be all freaked out. If I tried to hold them they would try & bite me, I have a lot of bird experience so I was careful, but these two birds were so anxious & afraid. I tried working to tame them outside their cages with perches, but they wouldn’t even stay on a perch long enough to ever get any further in the training. Female Parakeets can be harder to tame, but as you can see from the 1st photo on this post I have a female Parakeet sitting on my finger.
I started to make homemade seed mix for my foster birds. I didn’t have any Parakeets of my own but wanted all the birds to have a cleaner seed mix. I wanted to see if the manufactured seed mix I had been feeding was causing their issues, & yes I had been feeding a higher quality seed mix. I started to feed my homemade seed mix & after 3 months I noticed they were calmer & not getting freaked out when I walked into the room they were in. I decided to try again to tame them outside their cages, I use my bathroom as it is small & has a secure door I can shut so dogs or anyone else can’t interrupt. I was shocked & overjoyed that it took maybe one or two sessions & both the female Parakeets were perching on my fingers & my shoulders.
After two years of being with me the two female Parakeets were adopted to the next person who came to meet them, finally not overlooked because they were spastic messes. They acted like normal calm birds & were able to be handled by the people who came to meet them & ultimately adopted them. I didn’t change anything else but their seed diet, all my birds & my fosters were given fresh food 3 days a week. I saw other birds become calmer & able to be handled when they were changed to a homemade seed diet.
If you change to a homemade seed diet you need to be sure you are feeding fresh foods high in Vitamin A. I wrote a blog post about Vitamin A & Birds, it is #59. If your bird will not eat fresh food, first let me say, “don’t give up trying”, I wrote a post on that which is #4. While you’re working to get your bird to eat fresh food you can supplement Vitamin A through giving a supplement you add to their fresh water dish daily. I wrote a post about supplements for birds it is #83. I have had birds since about 1985 & have experience with a variety of birds through ownership, care-giving & fostering them.
My Homemade Parakeet Seed recipe:
1/2 lb. Red Millet
1/2 lb. White Millet
1/2 lb. Canola Seed (Rape seed)
1/2 lb. Niger Seed
1/2 lb. Canary Grass Seed
1/2 lb. Oat Groats
1/2 lb. Flaxseed
1/2 lb. Sesame Seeds
1/2 lb Mixed Nuts (buy in shell & crack open & break up into tiny pieces that a Parakeet can pickup with its beak). Walnuts, Pecans, Almonds, Hazelnuts (Filberts),Brazil nuts.
A package of Kaytee Bird Greens (photo below) be sure if you use another brand that it contains no Sulfur Dioxide.
I buy most of my seeds at a local Feed Store & the Sesame seeds were purchased in bulk for a natural grocery store or larger grocery store that carries a variety of food items. Wherever you buy your seeds & nuts from be sure the nuts & seeds are raw & have no added salt or other ingredients. Seeds & nuts made for human consumption often contain salt or are roasted,so not good for birds. Mix all the ingredients together & store in closed containers . I recommend glass or stainless steel such as clean popcorn tins (like you find around Christmas time). I place a silica gel pack or desiccant packs for freshness in each container of seed. These are not safe to consume, so be sure you don’t accidentally put them in your birds dish. I safe these from package of pet treats that I buy, so have them for seed containers.
I hope this post as well as others has been interesting to you & you found it educational. My goal is to share my 20+ years experience fostering a variety of pets & a lot more years of having pets myself. I am a researcher & not everyone is, so I am here to share what I have learned to help more pets to Thrive & not just survive. It is our responsibility as pet owners to do the best we can for the pets we care for. If you are enjoying my blog please help me spread the word so more people can find my blog posts,which will help more pets. You can do that by liking my posts (click the”like” button at the bottom of each post), link my blog on your social media sites, or email it to a pet loving family member or friend, comment on something you liked in a post or learned. You can subscribe so you don’t miss an episode (you will get an email notice when I publish a post). Visit often & read other posts (to date I have written 112 other posts on my blog). On the home page in the upper left corner under the show tab you can find the Table of Content for my other posts, then go back to the home page & scroll down to view the posts. If you have a question or want a copy of my research you can email me at echoinggreatpetcare@gmail.com I appreciate all my subscribers, thank you, Debbie
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