This salad treat for your favorite pet bird includes layers of fresh fruit and vegetables. Once a week, prepare a layered salad mix as follows, and place this into individual plastic containers.
Ingredients in Layers
- Chopped greens, which are varied each week. Options include collard greens, parsley, mustard greens, Swiss chard, kale and dandelion greens. (If you have only one parrot, or a few parrots, choose one type of greens, but vary this weekly.)
- Chopped (¼- to ½-inch cubes) green vegetables, including the following: brussels sprouts, zucchini and other summer squash, jicama, red or green peppers, fresh hot peppers, chayote squash, jicama, green beans, fresh peas, cucumber, celery, anise root, etc.
- Chopped broccoli and carrots.
- A mixture of chopped apples, oranges and whole grapes.
- Frozen mixed vegetables. The containers are then placed in the refrigerator (don’t freeze).
- High-quality seed mix
- Optional: pellets
Preparation
Thoroughly mix everything together. Add enough of a high-quality seed mix to make up 5 percent of this mix. Mix together and feed to the birds. (Pellets are optional, but their inclusion into this mix at some point can help with their introduction.)
Serving Suggestions
For one parrot, you might make three quart-sized containers. For 10 parrots, you might make four gallon-sized containers. For 30 parrots, you might make seven two-gallon containers. Make sure that you wash all the fruits, vegetables and greens well. A salad spinner can be used to dry the greens. This mix stays fresh in tubs for up to seven days.
Serve the mix each morning or as often as you need to.
