Fruits and vegetables might not provide adequate nutrition for your bird

This post is one of a series of informational posts written by Dr Randal Brue for one of our great sponsors, KAYTEE. For more information on Dr. Brue, click here.

Your pet bird may need additional nutrition even if fruits and vegetables are added to a seed diet. As you may know, fruits and vegetables do contain a lot of water, vitamin C and fiber. But surprisingly, most birds do not require Vitamin C in their diet because they manufacture it themselves. Fiber also has little nutritive value to birds.

As an animal nutritionist, I know that certain vegetables and fruits are better for birds. Deeply pigmented ones like the following are high in Vitamin A:

• Carrots
• Sweet potatoes
• Yams
• Spinach
• Kale
• Parsley
• Kiwi
• Guava

These vegetables and fruits can add a lot to the nutritional value of a diet, while grapes and apples do not add nearly as much. Even so, this diet is still deficient in Vitamin D and Calcium as well as the missing amino acids. It is certainly possible to provide a good diet of cereal grains, some seeds, vegetables, limited fruits and adequate protein sources such as egg, beans and animal products to a bird for it to do well. But do you have time to cook for your bird everyday?