A Word of Warning About A Seed Diet...

by Shelly
(South Africa)

I couldn't help notice that other canary owners feed seeds to their canaries. Just a word of warning about this...

I have a wild (orphaned) canary who is now 9 yrs old and was advised by an excellent avian vet many years ago to get all my caged birds off a seed diet and onto a properly balanced propriety canary foods granule diet.

I now buy an imported product from Belgium that is a small round granule containing everything a finch or canary needs.

Our local pet shop now stocks this food and uses it for their birds.

Apparently seeds are like "chocolate cake" for birds - they will always prefer it over anything else, but it will shorten their lives (my cockatiel died at only 12 yrs old after a seed diet all his life).

It takes a few weeks to wean a bird off seed, but once on the granules that is all they need, with seeds and grasses just given as a treat perhaps once or twice a month.

Hope this helps other bird lovers from losing their pets prematurely.

Regards, Shelly.

*****DARREN'S COMMENTS****
That's interesting information Shelly. Thanks.

I mention feeding pellets -- Canary Chow;-) -- in several places here at CanaryAdvisor.com.

The canary's natural diet is made up of various seeds, sprouts, and fresh grasses so I have a hard time believing that such a diet could be harmful.

Certainly pellets are full of nutrients and all the things that researchers "think" a canary needs.

I have no reason to believe that a canary pellet diet is insufficient but I do prefer to keep things as "natural" as possible when choosing canary foods. I do that by providing seed, sprouts, grasses, fruits, and veggies.

To each his (or her) own.

Thanks again. Very interesting.

*****DARREN'S COMMENTS****