Best Parrot Food – An introduction to psittacine’s Diet
Parrots are beautiful green avian creatures with red beaks. They make for excellent pets and keep you entertained all day through. Well, to do that, they need energy, don’t they?
They get their energy and nutrition from various food items. Just like humans, your precious small parrot needs a nutritionally balanced diet to entertain, keep healthy, and fit. Moreover, they also need interesting food pellets, seeds, fruits, and more.
Are you wondering what the best parrot food is? Fret not; we have got you covered. Perusing this article will enlighten you on parrot food in the market. Moreover, you will also get an idea of what parrots eat and drink.
So, read ahead and know the best parakeet food.
The 4 Best Parrot Food
You will find some of the best parrot food in terms of seeds, pellets, and mixes listed below. Choose one that works best for your pet bird.
Wild Harvest Parrot Food
Wild Harvest is a premium brand of bird food. They are dedicated and committed to giving your parrot nutritious and healthy food. This pet bird food comes in an 8-pound bag. It has a variety of ingredients and nutrients aimed at giving your parrots healthy skin and shiny feathers.
Moreover, the Advanced Nutrition bag has an array of seeds and vegetables. The bag comes with a fresh seal that enables you to store it for an extended period.
Pros
- Balanced nutrients
- Unique blend for healthy skin and feathers
- Includes important minerals and vitamins
Cons
- Possible quality control issues
- Stinky chemicals
Kaytee Forti-Diet Pro-Health Parrot Food
Kaytee Fort-diet Pro-Health parrot food supports luscious plumage, brain, and heart health. It gets specially blended omega-3 and antioxidants. This one the best bird food popularly recommended by vets too.
It contains immunity-boosting nutrients. Furthermore, it has probiotics and prebiotics to support good digestive health for your pet bird. What’s more is, this 8-pounds bag has only naturally preserved ingredients without any artificial flavors or colors. This bag gets made of a healthy mix of seeds and nuts for vitamins and minerals.
Pros
Promote brain and heart health
Gives your psittacines luscious plumage
Trusted brand with 150 years of experience
Cons
- Requires sterilization sometimes
- Quality control issues likely
ZuPreem Fruit Blend Parrot Food
ZuPreem is one of the popular and famous brands that has gotten dedicated to making bird food. This particular product is highly recommended. It is a pellet that has a fruit blend. Created with whole grains, this bag gets fortified with minerals, vitamins, and amino acids. The ZuPreem fruit blend has natural fruit colors and flavors.
Recommended by aviary specialists and vets, the fruit blend bag promotes cardiovascular and liver health. Moreover, your parrot will find it tasty and fun.
Pros
- Nutritious
- Vet certified
- Natural flavors
Cons
- Stains your carpet if it falls
Top’s Parrot Food
Top’s Parrot Food has gotten USDA organic certificate. Moreover, they use non-GMO ingredients that are fresh and natural. These are essentially hookbill pellets that get preserved naturally with rose hips, rosemary, and orange peel.
Top’s Parrot Food comes highly recommended because it doesn’t contain fillers like soy or corn. Furthermore, it is devoid of BHA, BHT, ethoxyquin, and any other artificial flavors, colors, or sugar.
A notable fact is that Top’s bird food is award-winning and highly recommended by vets.
Pros
- Organic
- Completely natural
- No peanuts, soy, or corn
Cons
- The texture could be unappealing to some parrots
What is a Parrot’s Diet?
Now that you know the best psittacines food available in the market, you might wonder what a psittacines diet is. You might be perplexed as to what else you can give your psittacines. Well, read ahead to know a parrot’s diet so that you can introduce variety to their food.
Moreover, understanding a parrot’s diet will help you make the right choice in buying the best parrot food. There are several options for a parrot’s diet. The best one depends on what your pet likes and the variety you can provide.
Variety is key to the best parrot diet. It gives them a nutritionally balanced diet with lots of flavor and different tastes.
Psittacines generally consume pellets and seeds. However, you need not limit yourself to feeding your psittacines only that. You can feed your psittacines some fresh fruits and vegetables too.
Types of psittacines Food
While deciding the best parrot food, it might help you to know the types of psittacine food. Knowing this will help you decide what you can feed your bird to keep them energized and fun-loving.
Avoid foods which are having artificial colors and artificial flavor.
Parrot Pellets
Pellets are popular psittacine food that has been around for over 30 years. Avian experts develop pellets with natural ingredients. Pellets are a blend of seeds, fruits, vegetables, and grains with an excellent nutritional punch.
Pelleted food should make for 50-70% of your pet bird’s diet. So, you must choose the right pelleted diet. The formulated diet should fresh, natural, organic, genetically unmodified pellets. Ensure your parrot’s pellets do not contain artificial preservatives, flavoring, or color.
Seed Mixes
These are essentially sprout mixes that help keep your parrot hale and healthy always. They are great sources of vitamins C, A, E, and B. Moreover, they are excellent sources of proteins, antioxidants, and minerals.
Choose fresh and organic seeds for your parrot to consume regularly. Seeds like millet, oat groats, sprouted seed, sunflower seed, pumpkin seed, safflower seed, yellow and orange lentils, black garbanzos, fenugreek, oriental mustard, shelled almonds, nutrient quinoa, and more seeds are an excellent addition to your birds’ diet.
A Seed mix can be considered as a balanced complete food for your bird. Seeds are rich vitamin sources for birds.
Nut Mixes
Your parrot also enjoys a variety of nut mixes. They can serve as treats and complete for your pet too. The safe nuts include almonds, pecans, cashews, hazelnuts, macadamias, peanuts, walnuts, and pistachios. However, ensure you feed your bird the unsalted variety only.
Fruits
Fresh Fruits offer a source of vitamins and minerals to your parrot. Avian nutritionists recommend chopping a variety of fruits and feeding it your parrot. Fresh fruit is necessary for balanced nutrition for your Bird.
Fruits like papaya, kiwi, berries, pomegranates, grapes, cranberries, apples, and bananas are some fruits you can safely feed your large parrots.
Vegetables
Your bird will appreciate a variety of colorful fresh vegetables rich in nutrition. You need to ensure all vegetables get finely chopped and not overly salty.
Carrots, green beans, pumpkin, corn, sweet peas, assorted peppers, sweet potato, and leafy greens are vegetables you should introduce to your parrot’s diet.
Your bird will get a healthy diet from the vegetable.
Proteins
Your parrot requires energy derived from proteins to keep you entertained. Moreover, they need proteins to keep them fit and active. Peanuts, Pistachios, peanut butter, and sprouts give your parrot a great source of protein.
Foraged and Wild Foods
They are wild birds in nature and picky eaters. Your pet parrot loves flying around and foraging for food. It stimulates them and helps your bird keep a sharp and healthy mind and adds nutritional value to their diet. Some foraged food includes dandelions, blackberries, hawthorn berries, fat hen plant, chickweed, orange blossom flower, and more.
Drinks
Your birds mainly drink plenty of water from various sources. Suppose your bird is in a cage; you should change its water at least twice a day. You can sometimes add some drops of cider vinegar to their water to amp up the flavor.
What Should You Avoid Feeding Your Pet Bird?
Since you know what you can include in your parrot’s diet, you must be cautious to avoid feeding your parrot certain things. It is crucial to ensure your parrot doesn’t get fatally harmed.
Ensure you read the ingredients of parrot food properly to avoid the below list. Stay away from these food items completely to protect your precious parrots.
- Avocado- leads to edema in your parrot’s pectoral and hydropericardium regions.
- Alcohol- tends to cause organ failure leading to death in parrots
- Caffeine- leads to hyperactivity, cardiac arrest, arrhythmia, and eventually cardiac failure
- Chocolate- causes methylxanthine toxicity in your parrots which can prove fatal
- Uncooked Beans- contains hemagglutinin that is poisonous to your psittacine
- Apple Seeds- contain cyanide and are dangerous not just for parrots but all birds
- Laburnum and Yew- are the poisonous plants that your parrot needs to stave away from
Overall, your parrots don’t need to consume fatty, salty, fried, and sugary foods. They can cause several medical issues for your parrot. You can always consult your vet to know more about the foods you should avoid feeding your parrot.
How to Choose the Best Parrot Food?
It would be best if you know what to look for when buying the best parrot food. 50-70% of parrot’s diet gets made of pellets and seeds. You need to ensure you purchase fresh foods that get naturally preserved and do not contain any artificial flavoring or colors.
Moreover, you must ensure your psittacine doesn’t consume artificial ingredients.
Suppose your parrot loves consuming peanuts; ensure it gets moderated. Peanuts tend to be fatty and can prove unhealthy for your psittacine.
You should take into consideration the following when choosing the best parakeet food.
Your parrot’s preferences and tastes
The type and size of your psittacine
Your parrot’s behaviors and activity level
The weight of your parrots
Of course, your budget too
Wrapping Up
Psittacines are beautiful, luscious, and green avian creatures. Their energy, activity level, and intelligence are stunning and keeps you entertained. For this stunningness to thrive, your parrots need the best food possible.
Parrots need various pellets, seeds, fruits, and vegetables to keep them healthy and fit. This article has a curated list of the best parrot food. Moreover, it enlightens you about your psittacine diet and what you should avoid.
So, what are you waiting for? Get the best parrot food for your avian creature!