I was wondering what everyone's Cockatiels eat?

Prinny eats seed, birdie bread, some pasta, and I am trying hard to get her to eat fresh fruits and veggies (she just doesn't seem to want to try it, so I have to put it in the bread).

Lulu eats:

Lafeber's Avicakes, Nutriberries, and Nutrimeals
Seed mix with no sunflower seeds

Fresh foods that are her favorites:
Scrambled eggs, brown rice, beans, peas, corn, whole wheat toast, Ginich's birdiebread (all flavors).

I am trying to get her to eat more dark greens, but she doesn't want to. I usually run the veggies through a food processor so she does get bits and pieces of the other things that I put in their fresh food mixes.

I haven't tried much pasta with my guys, but this weekend I'm going to make them a pasta dish with lots of veggies.

Buster eats fresh sprouted seed mix along with a bean and veggie or grains and veggie mix in the morning. I usually finely chop some sort of green like spinach, carrot tops, strawberry crowns and add them to the mix. Her sprouts are grown for about five days before feeding them, so they usually have some little leaves and roots beginning to show. She will pick out what she likes best first, then eat the next favorite thing and so on. Somehow, she seems to get a pretty good balance of everything as she picks at all of it at least. This stays in her cage during daylight hours, from about 8 or 9 a.m. until about 6 p.m. All fresh sprouts and vegetables are washed with a veggie wash and rinsed well before serving. I also add a little lemon juice over the mix to retard bacterial growth and keep fruit bits from browning.

In the evening, I give her one of about four different bird breads I bake for her, mixed with some dry seed (the same mix I sprout). I will also add some low fat, low or no sugar cereal like Grape Nuts, Cheerios or Shredded Wheat. This stays in her bowl overnight.

When it comes to getting Prinny to eating new foods like veggies, there is no one size fits all solution. First, let's remember that these guys don't really run across big, leafy vegetable plants like spinach, cabbage and lettuces in the wild. Most of the greens they eat in the wild are freshly sprouted grasses, leaves of various trees and shrubs, etc. The broadest leaves they are like to have experience with would be things like cowslip and dandelions. This leads us to the second thing, texture and color. Birds in general do not have greatly developed sense of taste. Parrots probably have the best developed taste buds but even theirs are fairly limited. Therefore, they depend on other attributes like size, texture and color to recognize edible things. I chop most of Buster's greens down to about the size of the sprouts. I don't chop the beans and grains as she took to those very readily. This seems to help with her trying new things. She is much more likely to "beak" something if it is familiar in size. Thirdly is trust. Birds do as they see others do and they like to feel secure when they are trying something new. About four months ago, Buster began to eat her breakfast from Kent's hands while we had coffee in the morning. This coincided with our decision to change her diet to fresh/fresh cooked foods and worked out perfectly! She will try almost anything as long as it is in our hand when she tries it out. Everything from sprouts and beans to bits of gingersnap and tortillas started out this way. Buster isn't the first bird I've used this method with and I have always found it highly effective.

Now, I'm not saying Buster gobbles down everything we give her. She ignores "English Peas" and broccoli so far but she will push it around and occasionally take a bite. She loves corn, cooked rice, cooked barely and sprouted canary seed best of all. Keep working with the fids on various things and remember that your conures, being more tropical in origin have an evolutionary exposure that is much broader in color and texture than an outback bird evolving in a climate that is primarily sub-tropical desert.

Well, I certainly didn't mean to write a book! Can you say "info geek"? Thanks for letting me tie up so much space!

Thanks for all that info! I did put a bunch of stuff in a food processor once and she ate a little that way. I will just keep trying!

My tiels eat most anything that I put in front of them -- seeds, pellets, beans, rice, veggies, berries, chicken, tuna, not TOO crazy about most fruit, but will play with it. The tiels that I am babysitting are a little fussier -- not nearly so pleased with fruit and veggies, not even sure about beans, but they certainly won't starve themselves!

My tiels eat pellets (Vetafarm) and even though I always give them fresh veggies everyday, they don't seem real fussed on them. They eat baby broccoli quite happily but just seem to play with the other veggies.

My Tiel Tobi is a fussy bird indeed. I've tried different things from time to time but she just won't try it... She will eat seeds no doubt and I do mix in pellets, and a dried fruits/seed tropical mix. She does love fresh figs I think it's the seed inside them that she loves more. I do give her millet every once in a while too. she'll eat a little rye bread some times too. Other wise that's it..But I still try new things hoping her taste will change.