My pet cockatiel, Parker Charles Yardbird, likes to eat meat. Tuna, chicken, turkey, lamb, whatever. Cooked dead animal flesh. I feed him an adequate diet, he ignores the veggies I give him. (he does like to eat the houseplants, though, I have a hell of a time keeping him away from them.)
It doesn’t even necessarily have to be what I’m eating, although he does have a preference for whatever’s on my plate.
I’m not worried about him nutritionally, I’ve called a couple of pet stores and I’ve been told that eating people food is good for him, it adds variety to his diet, as long as I don’t give him chocolate, avocados or too much bread.
But small parrot-like birds eating meat? Makes me just a bit nervous that a seed/plant eater so enthusiastically goes after my lamburger…
Just hope that you don’t wake up in the night and find him at your throat!
A little animal protein in beneficial for birds, but don’t let it become a major portion of his diet.
A great many birds scavenge in the wild. I always have a tray containing suet, table scraps, old fish heads, etc. under my bird feeder, mainly for the woodpeckers. I get a lot of seed eaters such as chickadees hitting it.
It’s that dinosaurian heritage. Ever see a fighting cock? (No, not that kind.) The chickens with a big metal spur on each foot? Velociraptor genetic memory.
Thea - yeah, they LOVE meat. Also cheese, eggs, salt, sugar - just about anything you shouldn’t eat (much) but do, they’ll love it.
I just figure the meat replaces all of the insects they eat in the wild (lots of bugs in & around fruit & grain, y’know).
The important thing is to remember how SMALL your bird is. What seems like a small bit to you may be huge to him. Compare one of your ‘bite-size’ pieces to your bodyweight, and then to his. As the petstores said, VARIETY in his diet is the key.
If he likes to eat houseplants, you might try giving him his own garden. Plant a pot of lettuce or alfalfa or something like that & let him chew away. Many birds love that and it’s good for them too.
PS A hint for when your friends start freaking out because your ‘cannibal’ bird is eating birdmeat. Your cockatiel is about as closely related to that chicken as you are to a cow.
