I would like to feed Kiwi mostly fresh food. She is on seed but lately I have been giving her lettus, pasta, peas and some other things. She hasn't really been touching her seed. She has but mostly eating her fresh stuff. Is this ok? I know I am eventually going to switch her to pellet if she will let me but for right now I want to try to get some other good things in her instead of all seed. I want her to get a variety. I am going to the grocery store later is there any suggestions on what to pick up to give her a good variety?

Rosita likes banana slices (with the skin on). The best part is the little end of the banana, she can eat it like an icecream cone. She takes out all the banana and leaves the skin. I only give her 2 small pieces a day as it does have a lot of sugar. She also likes broccoli and cooked beans w/brown rice and this bird bread that I make (got the recipe through this forum). I'm also trying to get her to eat more veggies, but she isn't cooperating all that well. I switched her from seed to Roudybush, the "small" size pellets and she really likes the Roudybush. She eats Zupreem fruit pellets, but only the green ones! I give her about 8 to 10 raw sunflower seeds every day that you can buy in bulk from Sprouts or other small healthy type grocery stores. Someone suggested baked sweet potatoes, but she didn't take to that very well.

Be careful with going to a mostly, or all, fresh food diet. Pellets and seeds are meant to be a staple part of our birds diet. It can be very difficult to provide all the nutrients are fids need by only (or mostly) feeding fresh foods.

I think it is better to feed your fid seed as the main part of her diet and supplement with fresh foods then for her to be on an all seed diet or mostly fresh food diet. Seeds get a bad rap...they really *aren't* that bad when the bird is eating fresh foods as well.

I would limit to giving her fresh foods to twice a day. In the morning and at dinner time is a good choice. Remember to never leave fresh foods in the cage for more than a few hours (I usually only leave it in for an hour then toss it into the trash) as bacteria starts to grow quite quickly.

As a side note, there isn't much nutritional value to lettuce, so I would try other leafy greans like kale

I have to disagree with you on that one, Carrie~Anne!

Seed shouldn't make up more than about 20% of a bird's daily intake. Fresh fruit and vegetables should account for another 60%, with the rest consisting of nuts, pulses and a bit of whatever you're having (as long as it's healthy food, of course).

Here's a very good article about what you should be feeding your bird.