Supplements?

[StellaBlue]

Does anyone else ever use vitamins or other supplements in their recipes?

I first cooked for my birds many years ago - soft food for a spectacled amazon who had his upper mandible removed by a wayward U2, and eggfood for the finches I was breeding. I used Petamine in both mixes, added bone meal to the amazon's diet to help rebuild beak (he grew back a little nub, but never grew back the whole thing), and added a nestling food (with yummy dried bugs) to the finch mix.

These days I still like to add supplements occasionally - I have used both Petamine (hard to find, have to order it online) and Kaytee moulting and conditioning food (easy to find, but I don't like it as much). I particularly like using them to give the diet a bit of a nutritional boost when my birds are moulting (like the poor evvvvvil severe macaw, who is losing her stress-barred feathers and growing pretty new ones) or under stress (like evacuating them for the hurricane or boarding them while we remodeled).

Does anyone else use any nutritional supplements, vitamins, etc? What have you used? Did you like it? Why or why not?

[felisdomesticus]

when I took Scarlett to the vet, she said that papillae (??) at the back of her throat weren't pointy enough. I had adopted her in June and took her to the vet in early Nov. This is apparently due to a lack of Vit. A.

I have been cooking/chopping tremendous amounts of foods for her since she came into our home. I pay far more attention to her nutrition than mine. She has an excellent diet. Yet the vet didn't like the look of her throat.

They "prescribed" Prime vitamin supplement for her. I have been giving it to her once or twice a week on her meals. I don't feel comfortable giving it to her more often. I also have been opening Vitamin E capsules into her mashed sweet potato. Yehuda taught me that Vitamin A absorption is assisted by the presence of Vitamin E.

The only other supplement I add to her diet is fish oil. When I make a batch of birdie bread, I open 4 or 5 capsules of fish oil into the batter.

[MaryG1959]

Try baking a yam, mashing it w/peanut butter, chopped nuts or anything else enticing. Yam/Sw. Potatoe is full of vitamin A.

[StellaBlue]

Originally Posted by MaryG1959

Try baking a yam, mashing it w/peanut butter, chopped nuts or anything else enticing. Yam/Sw. Potatoe is full of vitamin A.

Ok, true confession time. I do give my birdies yams and sweet potato, but I don't mash them. I nuke small ones, let them cool, and cut them in half. This is strictly for human enrichment - the birds tunnel into them, sticking their entire little heads into the sweet potato half, and it gives me the giggle fits. I give them a little time to groom each other afterwards, then hose 'em off.

I once lived with a red-foot tortoise that did the same thing - except that sometimes she would pick up her little head and wander around with the potato half still on her head. Funniest darn thing...

[Adi]

I just bought a liquid calcium supplement but have yet to use it. When purchasing some supplies from a local breeder, she recommended it because she told me that the calcium in cuttlebone is not readily absorbed.

I'll be mixing a few drops in the food every week or so.

Since a lovebird is quite small, I find it a tad difficult to get them a proper variety in the quantity of food they eat. Soft mixes help a great deal but I'm sure a reasonable amount of supplements can help give them the nutrition they need.

[mpebs]

We lace our soft food with a multi-vitamin called Prime. You can buy it at petsmart and other places.

[felisdomesticus]

Originally Posted by mpebs

We lace our soft food with a multi-vitamin called Prime. You can buy it at petsmart and other places.

Prime is what the vet told me to add to the redhead's food. She flat-out wouldn't eat anything with Prime sprinkled on it.

Nowadays I add a teeny tiny scoop to her mashed sweet potatoes and birdie bread mix before I bake it. Other than that, it just sits in the cabinet. She hates it.

[The Outlaw]

I have used The Missing Link before. I don't know if it helped. I don't think my birds require anything more, but I do offer extra calcium, weekly. I buy the powdered stuff recommended for lizzards and sprinkle it on their wet foods.

[Doubleyolk]

I feel that if you feed a good pellet and fresh veggies,fruits there is no need for supplements. The only time I would use a supplement is for female parrots and it would be calcium if egg shell wasn't used in birdie bread or like cooked foods. Again JMO There is a good book called "The Healthy Bird Cookbook" by Robin Deutsch that has Species Specific recipes to make sure your parrot gets a well rounded diet.

[felisdomesticus]

Originally Posted by The Outlaw

I have used The Missing Link before.

I use the feline Missing Link for my cats and my fosters. It really improves the health of the shelter cats I pull--they come to me with colds, coughs, snot, etc.--but some good food and Missing Link clears it up.

I have heard of avian Missing Link but have never seen it in stores or even online. I would like to think that Scar has a complete diet and doesn't need it--but I'd love to find it to use now and then.