Feeding

[jgee]

I am new here. I raised Australian parakeets twenty-seven years ago, and just now got back into it. I have a pair of Rock Pebblers (Regent Parrots), a pair of Princess Wales, and a pair of Mulgas. I am getting a pair of Barrabands and that will complete the aviary.

This may seem weird but I feel like I forgot some things after all this time. The birds are doing really well, eating up a storm, making all their wonderful sounds and are flying/walking around.

They are in an aviary 15 feet long, 8 feet high and seven feet wide. So, they have room to fly. And, actually, I am going to enlarge it somewhat before the final pair come. I am going to add another 13 feet in length.

I have three feeding stations in the aviary, one hanging, one on the ground and one in a bird bath stand. Of course, I feed a diverse diet of seeds, fruits, grasses, vegetables, etc. I am not familiar with the pellets, as I don’t remember them from before.

My question is this, these guys seem to be eating (particularly the Mulgas) a lot. Should I keep the feeding stations supplied (as I am now) or allocate food on a pre measured basis per day?

[Monica]

Wow, I'm envious!!! Would love to have an aviary that size, and outdoors!!!! For now though, a 9x10 (12) foot room will suffice for a few smaller birds!

Pellets are recently new in aviculture, but as long as they get plenty of exercise, and a variety of foods everyday, it sounds like your doing well... especially if you provide a variety of veggies and native (safe) plants (i.e. bottlebrush).

For my birds I prefer to feed them only enough food to last them one day.... I know that some people who keep aviaries may feed in larger quantities that would last more than a day (dry foods that's fine) which is probably fine as long as they all get exercise... however fresh foods, when fed daily, need to be removed after 2-3 hours to prevent spoilage...

[jgee]

Monica, this is such a good, concise and correct answer. Thank you so much, it is quite helpful. I feel like I am in sync now with their feeding and it seems to be right. I am doing exactly what you suggested.

BTW, the aviary is indoors with full spectrum lighting. I live in a climate that is too cold in the winter for outdoors.

[Monica]

Still, I've love to be able to have the space to do something like that properly!! And well your probably in the states, too...

You may be interested in getting the Healthy Bird Cookbook by Robin Deutsch. Quite Informative! There's also an older one, I think it's called Feeding Your Parrot, which has a lot of great info in it as well, copywrite 1993.