Healthy Food for your Parakeet

The native parakeet grew up in the grasslands of Australia, living in eucalyptus trees. Those grasslands provided the parakeets what they needed to live. They would eat the fresh greens, the fruits and berries they found there, and the seeds that came in the fall.

So while parakeet seed is ONE part of what a parakeet's diet should have in it, it is definitely not ALL, and a parakeet raised solely on parakeet seed will have some form of malnutrition. Even the fortified seeds you find in stores are usually fortified with a powder sprinkled on the outside of the seed. Since a parakeet hulls its seeds before eating them, leaving behind that outer shell, the fortification does little good.

Below is a photo of typical parakeet seed. It offers a few different shapes and sizes for the parakeet to nibble on. Seed is fine as a start, but it is NOT enough. What if YOU tried to live on just white bread? You'd miss a ton of nutrients. Your parakeet is the exact same way.

The Association of Avian Veterinarians recommends the following diet for a parakeet:

50% cooked beans, whole wheat bread, cooked rice, pasta, and seed
45% fresh broccoli, carrots, yams, spinach, dandelion greens, other green/orange fruits and veggies
5% eggs, tuna packed in water, well cooked meat

Overfeeding a Parakeet
Parakeets do NOT overeat. If anything, people tend to give them too little food, thinking a seed cup is full when really it's just full of the hulls of the seeds the parakeet has already eaten. Be sure to refill your parakeet's food supply daily and to give him or her lots of fresh foods too.

Healthy Food by Vitamin
Index of Healthy Food and Water for Parakeets