Background knowledge about the right budgie food is extremely important for owners of Germany’s most popular pet bird.

In addition to balanced ready-made food for the small parrot, the feed can be supplemented with fresh and individual products useful for the budgie.

The Best Tips For Budgie Food

With healthy and varied nutrition, the budgie feels good all around. Of course, you can buy budgie food.

The pet store offers a wide selection of different manufacturers, which offer mixtures tailored to the needs of the species-appropriate diet of the budgie.

In addition, you can make the daily budgie food off your little parakeet extremely varied.

Background knowledge about the right budgie food is extremely important for owners of Germany’s most popular pet bird. In addition to balanced ready-made food for the little parrot, the budgie food can be supplemented with fresh and individual products.

With healthy and varied nutrition, the budgie feels good all around. The right budgie food also has a positive effect on the attitude.

Buying budgie food is the easiest way to do the best for your feathered friend. The pet store offers a wide selection of different manufacturers, which offer mixtures tailored to the needs of species-appropriate nutrition of the budgie.

In addition, you can make the daily budgie food of your talking artist extremely varied.

We have compiled the best tips on the subject of budgie food.

Healthy Budgie Food Is Vital

How crucial the right food is for the budgerigar is shown by what happened when it arrived in Europe. The English explorer John Gould had brought the first specimens of the budgerigar from Australia in 1840.

He gave them the Latin name Melopsittacus undulatus, which translates as “wavy song parrot.” This eventually became the name budgerigar. Anyway, in the beginning, many birds died because they didn’t get the right budgie food.

As with all healthy diets, budgie food must be balanced. In their native Australia, the little parrots love grasses above all.

While young oats are no problem in this country, it becomes difficult to offer plants such as spinifex, canary seed, or even Mitchell grass as budgie food. Free-ranging budgies prefer grass seed in their diet if nothing else.

Buying Budgie Food: Ready-made Or Home-mixed?

Manufacturers of bird food have adapted to these needs. Ready-made mixtures with a main proportion of millet supplemented with a selection of seeds and chickweed, you can conveniently buy as food for your budgie. This budgie food covers the daily needs of vitamins, minerals, and fiber. Millet also contains many minerals, such as magnesium, potassium, and iron. You can choose from products of well-known manufacturers, as well as those of unknown companies, which differ mainly in price.

If you want to buy budgie food, first pay attention to the date of manufacture and shelf life.

Then take a look at the composition of the food for your budgie: a balanced seed mixture should not contain additives and unnecessary sugar, such as dextrose. Also, fats, oils, or whey products have nothing to look for in a healthy budgie food.

Apart from the ready-made mixtures that you can buy as budgie food, many pet stores offer the possibility that you compose your own budgie food.

The food at the budgerigar should consist of different quantity proportions so that the budgerigar remains healthy:

• 45% special types of millet, such as Senegal or plata millet
• 25 % silver millet
• 25 % canary seed
• 5 % oats or oleaginous seeds, such as linseed or sesame seeds

And how do you manage to achieve the right proportions? It’s simple: Choose the amount of 1000 grams of budgie food. Then add a 0 to each of the above percentages, and you have the gram number, which can be weighed quite easily.

Budgerigar Food Varied Design

Variety is a must, especially when it comes to budgie food. Every budgie is happy about fresh, crunchy products. The principle is: less fruit and more green stuff. Because fruit does not belong to the budgie food in its home country Australia.

In addition, too much fruit in the budgie food could harm the bird. Fruit contains fruit sugar (fructose), which the budgie in the feed may only take limited.

This is especially true for budgies that have macrorhabdiosis. Even after overcoming the disease, the fruit must be avoided in these birds.

Otherwise, too much sugar in the budgie food can cause diarrhea even in healthy birds.

Otherwise, you can supplement the budgie food for example with peeled apple or apricot pieces. Please make sure to remove the fresh budgie food after three hours at the latest, so that it does not become moldy and your little parrot gets sick.

Budgies are happy to eat lettuce, but this fresh product is not very nutritious. Above all, you should always offer unsprayed lettuce or fruit.

Herbs are basically popular with budgies as food. You can gather them in the wild, but please do so away from roads and dog droppings.

Basil and sage contain essential oils, so these products should be used as budgie food exceedingly sparingly or not at all.

Fresh Budgie Food: The Right Diet

All greens are not created equal, and the term “healthy” has many facets. Your budgie deserves food that it can tolerate and that promotes its health.

We have compiled a list of products that you can easily offer as budgie food:

Fruit (Peeled, Unsprayed, Seedless)

• Pineapple
• Pomegranate
• Melon
• Raspberries
• Bananas
• Apricot
• Papaya
• Strawberry
• fresh figs
• Beechnuts
• Quince
• Rose hips (without seeds)

Lettuce (Organic Quality)

• Lamb’s lettuce
• Oak leaf lettuce
• Radicchio
• Romaine lettuce
• Endive lettuce
• Lollo rosso

Vegetables

• Bell bell pepper
• Radish
• Beetroot
• Carrots and carrot greens
• Pumpkin and pumpkin seeds
• Potatoes (boiled)
• Zucchini

Herbs

• Thyme
• Chervil
• Tarragon
• Chickweed
• Dandelion
• Marigold blossoms
• St. John’s wort (strengthens the immune system)
• Flowers of daisies (withered and without stems)

The Special Treats

More and more bird owners are turning to sprouted food for budgies. Sprouted food is rich in vitamins and minerals.

Thus it supplements the usual fodder with the budgerigar meaningfully – provided that it is used correctly.

In the pet shop, there are appropriate seeds, especially for budgies. Also, health food stores offer a good selection. For germination for budgie food, wheat, naked oats and special mixtures that have already been adjusted are suitable.

They are available as “fine” or “coarse”. For your budgie food, you should choose the “fine” selection.

Budgie Food À La Carte: Make Your Own Sprouted Food

For the production of sprouted food, you need a sieve (preferably made of stainless steel) and a small, somewhat deeper bowl. First, clean the grains under running water in the sieve.

Then hang the sieve in the bowl and add just enough water to cover the grains. After a maximum of three hours, drain the water. The grains for your homemade budgie food are now moist, but no longer covered with water.

After 24 hours the first seeds will germinate. Gently rinse your seed mixture under running water two to three times a day, but always leave the grains exposed to air.

As soon as the first green shoots have formed, you can offer them to your budgie as food. Important: Remove uneaten sprouts from the cage after four hours at the latest.

Do’s And Don’ts Of Budgie Food

With all the interesting information about grains, fruits, and greens in budgie food, the question arises whether the little parrots may also eat other treats? The answer is: Yes, but please only in extremely small quantities.

Eggs contain a lot of protein and valuable proteins. As budgie food, you should offer the egg hard-boiled. If your budgie is molting, you can promote its well-being with boiled egg yolk.

For the budgie food, the rule of thumb is: At most once a week some egg yolk or egg white. The reason: eggs contain a lot of cholesterol.

The eggshell – also cleaned and boiled – the budgie likes to use as a source of calcium. Before you give them to your budgie as food, you have to grind them.

You can also supplement the budgie’s food with cooked pasta. It is best to choose noodles made of durum wheat semolina, do without oil or salt when cooking, and give them to your budgie similar to cooked potatoes only in cooled form.

You should rather do without rice for homemade budgie food. Rice draws water and swells, which can quickly lead to digestive problems in the budgie.

In recent years, insects have found their way into the European trade. They are considered a good source of protein, of course, also for the budgie. A mealworm can be on the menu of your budgie from time to time.

You should avoid dairy products in your budgie’s diet. Budgies are naturally lactose intolerant, so dairy products cause diarrhea and digestive problems. Permitted as a budgie food is now and then a lactose-free yogurt with live cultures.

General Tips On Budgie Food

Budgies do not eat grain food whole. They de-husk each grain and drop the husk.

Therefore, regular inspection of the food bowl is important: the chaff and husks from the budgie food must be removed, so that you yourself and also your budgie can see how much food is still available.

For the additional amount of minerals, especially calcium, the budgie food should be supplemented with limestone or cuttlebone.

As for drinking water, you can give your budgie tap water to the food; the water quality in Germany meets all requirements. Of course, still, mineral water with a good mineral content is also suitable.

With these tips and our selection of products, you can give your budgie a carefree life.