I have a Seed Junkie - HELP!

One of the questions I'm most often asked is how to get a seed junkie to accept other healthy foods. There are a lot of ways to get a wider range of nutrients into their little feathered bodies :) but one way that has nearly always worked for me is sprouting. Actually when I saw sprouting, I mean germinating, but sprouting is easier to say. I'll explain further, below.

If you have a bird that already likes dormant seeds, then the chances are pretty good that he'll also like them germinated. Take a spoonful of your bird's favorite seed/grain mix, rinse it in a little strainer, and put it in a dish of water to soak for about 24 hours, rinsing and refreshing the water a couple of times during that period. After that time, you can either mix the now-germinated seeds and grains in with the dry ones he's used to, or pat them dry on a paper towel and feed them instead. If he won't eat them instead, then mix them with his existing seed mix in increasing amounts until he's used to them.

BUT!!! If your seed/grain mix contains anything other than seeds and grains, you can do this. They must be pure seeds and grains; anything else soaking with them will spoil and contaminate the new live foods with bacteria.

I have more to write on the subject of sprouting, but that will be for another article. It's a whole topic itself :).

Other things you can try to entice your seed junkie to learn to accept other foods:

Share. When you're eating your own healthy food, if your bird shows an interest, offer him some. He may not like any of it at first, but he may surprise you, too! Eventually he'll try something he likes.

Make it fun. Offer foods as something to explore and play with. Open up a squash and put it in the cage. Hang bits of fruits and veggies from a skewer where a toy normally hangs. Rinse off some curly kale and hide little grains of millet in the folds. Be creative, and make it enticing.

Hide the familiar food under or behind or in the new food. When I got my African Gray (2nd hand, as most of my birds are), he refused vegetables. So I'd run fresh veggies and sprouts through my food processor to create a "slaw", then mix it with his seed mix. He'd have to poke through to get to his beloved seeds, and it wasn't a week before he loved the slaw and didn't care if there were seeds in it or not! You can scoop out a cantaloupe and put the favored food in the "bowl", as well...use your imagination, make it an enrichment activity at the same time as you're introducing new tastes. (Just remember, when your bird's seeds have been in contact with fresh foods, bacteria will grow on them so they'll have to be replaced frequently.)

Be patient. No matter what you're trying to do, just keep at it, don't get frustrated, don't starve your bird into dietary submission, just be patient. Birds don't die from living on seeds and grains for a while, he made it this far, the situation isn't urgent. (And if it is, he should be under the care of an avian vet!)

My first product came to be because of a seed junkie cockatiel. He was 8 years old when his owner died and I agreed to take him, and as hardened a seed junkie as they come! He would eat sunflower seeds, millet sprays (millet is very healthy grain, not a seed, and most birds love it!), and honey treat sticks. And no matter what I tried, nothing could change his habits.

Then when he was about 20 years old (yeah, 20 - on a diet of seeds and grains - so much for the "seed diets kill birds" myth), I tried something new with him...and at first glance he not only ate it, but he GOBBLED IT! And then looked for more! I was pretty surprised, and sent some of this to my friends and people online who had seed junkie birds, and they all had the same experience! And that turned out to be my first product, which is still a top seller and has been used to help thousands of birds learn that there are other food options besides seeds.

But, that too is a tale for another time. If you have a seed junkie, give these suggestions a try. If they still don't work, write to me...we'll see what we can do to help your seed junkie expand his dietary repertoire :).