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Seed diet problems

OllieTheConure

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Hello everyone! I recently adopted a 9 year old sun conure named Sunny. He is still getting used to me but settling in well. His old owner cared about him, but was not knowledgeable about sun conures. Sunny has been fed a seed diet his whole life. He had a cage that was much too small, it was very tall but only just over one foot long and one foot wide. I have a vet checkup planned, but was wondering if anyone has a rough idea of how a high fat diet with little exercise will affect him? I don't know if this information is accurate, but I read conures fed a seed diet will only live about 10 years. I am worried because he is already 9. Also, I would love any tips and suggestions about making the transition from seed to pellets and veggies easier! Thank you for your help!
 

Ppoi

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Congrats on your new buddy!

Sorry I don't know the quickest way to transition him to pellets. You can offer fresh foods, by eating it and offering bits of what you have. I know my green cheek and lovebird (sometimes)will eat what I am eating. This may only work if he trusts you, but hand feeding can build trust too. Maybe, pretend eating the pellets and offering it may work too.

My greencheek conure now wants everything I eat. I have to hide that I am eating, when eating junk food. Eating junkfood is not as enjoyable anymore, haha.
 

Peachfaced

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Try your best with the new diet and enjoy the time you have with him. You can't go wrong with loving on him.
 

MagpieDragon

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I converted Nedd onto pellets by adding warm water to mush them up into a paste, and adding it to the diet he was originally on. It took a few weeks, but it's worth it (your conure may take longer or less time tho). Just make sure to add it gradually, or it could upset his stomach. Try starting with a mix of 3/4 seed and 1/4 pellets, and increase it slowly from there on.

Hope it helps :)
 

Mizzely

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High fat + little exercise is a recipe for heart disease. That being said, birds are resilient little things and some fed the worst diets still live much longer than we expect they might :) Don't stress about how many tomorrows you have or you will forget to enjoy today
 

BrianB

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It takes time to switch to a mostly pellet diet, but it can be done. You just have to be patient. I'm got most of mine off of seed to all pellets. The others are making progress bit by bit. The last few are down to about 90% pellets 10% seeds. Birds can be stubborn, especially when something very routine changes. Start slow, but remember at some point, you may have to be more stubborn than they are.
 

Chantilly Lace

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FYI, some vets will do the food change for you, for a price of course. I just thought it was worth mentioning. My Pionus was the same, it took a month or so to switch.
 

Skipper

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I noticed Gilligan was up to 88 grams the other day, so no more safflower seed with his pellets and fruit. He eats pellets and fruit just fine, so no more junk seed. Off to the vet tomorrow for labs.
 

OllieTheConure

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Thank you everybody for your replies! We will try our hardest to get Sunny smoothly switched from seed to pellets and veggies. And in the meantime, Sunny is making progress and loves getting to just hang around us and be loved on. We will do our best to make the rest of his life, no matter how long or short he’s with us, the best it can be! :heart:
 

Parakeet88

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Try all different kinds of pellets to see what he likes. Some people will argue what brands are better but I think any brand of pellet is better than seed. Also getting him onto any type of pellet first will make it easier to eventually switch pellets if needed. All of my birds are on zupreem but they all prefer smaller sized pellets. My parakeets eat the finch/ canary size and my conure eats the cockatiel size. I noticed that when they were on seed they always picked out the smallest seeds first so I got them similarly sized pellets. I honestly don't remember how I did the switch. I think I started off giving them a seed/ pellet mix and gradually added more pellets everyday. Eventually I noticed them eating the pellets and now they love them. My birds were young when I switched them so it might take longer for your bird to switch since he's been on seed for so long.

Just remember that he probably doesn't recognize the pellets as food. Keeping that in mind helped me keep my patience with the process. Your bird is not just being like a bratty kid refusing to eat his vegetables, he literally doesn't know he can eat the pellets. The trick is getting him to recognize them as food. The same applies to fresh foods, he probably doesn't know what they are so he needs time to explore and figure out he can eat them. Good luck and enjoy your new friend!
 

Mizzely

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Try all different kinds of pellets to see what he likes. Some people will argue what brands are better but I think any brand of pellet is better than seed. Also getting him onto any type of pellet first will make it easier to eventually switch pellets if needed.

Agreed. I have the most luck with Zupreem fruity as the "gateway" pellet here. I have taken on 3 seed junkies so far and all have converted to pellets using it.

The exceptions to this are Totally Organics Pellets and Goldenfeast Goldn Obles, as those are not complete foods like the rest. They are missing vital nutrients.
 

Hesh

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I converted Nedd onto pellets by adding warm water to mush them up into a paste, and adding it to the diet he was originally on. It took a few weeks, but it's worth it (your conure may take longer or less time tho). Just make sure to add it gradually, or it could upset his stomach. Try starting with a mix of 3/4 seed and 1/4 pellets, and increase it slowly from there on.

Hope it helps :)
This is the method that I used for two conures also!
 

BrianB

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My last two are still getting a little seed with their pellets. These are blue crowns and they are pretty stubborn, though no match for me. One screams for seeds, even though he eats the pellets. He's still getting a teaspoon of seeds with his pellets, but we're close to the end and he's not happy about it. The other is a rescue. She eats pellets just fine, but she's been getting sun flower seeds as well. She's had a hard life, but I'm working on getting her off of the sun flower seeds and saving them for treats and rewards. I never bothered adding water to the pellets because all of them dip the pellets into their water while they are eating them.
 

Donna turner

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Aftcer trying the slow route to get my gcc off seeds onto pellets with no success (she wouldn't even try one) I took everything else away for a day. Next morning I came into her room and found her munching away on her pellets lol. She just had to get hungry enough.
 

finchly

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All of my birds are on zupreem but they all prefer smaller sized pellets.
Mine too!

Aftcer trying the slow route to get my gcc off seeds onto pellets with no success (she wouldn't even try one) I took everything else away for a day. Next morning I came into her room and found her munching away on her pellets lol. She just had to get hungry enough.
I’ve done something similar. I remove containers for awhile. They get their seed, pellets, and fresh food sort of in rotation. This is because I’m on a mission to stop wasting food. :faint:

Also, you can cook some pellets into your bird bread so that they’re getting nutrition HIDDEN. This is like when I used to sneak veggies into my kids’ meatloaf. LOL
 

BrianB

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I know there are a lot of different pellets out there. Is there one people prefer over the other ? I'm using Mazuri for mine based on the recommendation of an avian specialist that works for a zoo
 
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