Comments on "Proper Feeding by Glen Reynolds"

Posted: Thu Mar 15, 2007 8:23 pm Post subject: Proper Feeding by Glenn Reynolds

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Proper Feeding by Glenn Reynolds

At page 7 of the thread “Let’s Just Share” NDoan sets out the text of an interesting article entitled “Proper Feeding” by Glenn Reynolds.

An article may be interesting because it teaches us something that we do not know but want to know, or, as in the case of this article, it makes us think and consider if the author is right or wrong and, if he is right, the extent to which we agree with him.

The article starts with a point that is unargueable. It notes: Proper nutrition in any life form is the base requirement for growth, health and reproduction. ….. Without adequate nutrition no life form can reach its maximum genetic size, optimal immune system function or greatest reproductive ability. Even with superior genetics, advanced husbandry and state of the art disease prevention, sub-adequate nutrition will prevent success.

Health care management begins with nutrition. Approximately 80 percent of all medical problems reported in birds are related in some way to poor nutrition

I am not sure about the 80% but other than this, so far, so good. The article then states:

Unfortunately we are under the delusion that elaborate cafeteria style diets which satisfy our own egos will be good for our birds. This is not the case. Although birds in the wild instinctively know what to eat, captive birds offered this type of diet will simply eat their favorite few ingredients and leave the rest, while begging for more.


Is this true, I ask myself, that birds in the wild instinctively know what to eat but once they become captive, they somehow lose this ability? I would have wanted to know the research that Reynolds relied on for his statement. He refers to none and the question arises as to the reliability of what he says. He then states:


…….. The only way these type of diets work is to know exactly what our birds need, know what foods contain these nutrients, and in what proportions. Then, they must be fed measured amounts in such a manner that everything is completely eaten.


Is this true, I again ask myself, that for “cafeteria style diets” (as Reynolds puts it) to work the food must be dished out in measured amounts? I know little about parrot type birds to which the article is meant to apply but I can say that this does not appear to be the case with softbills. When I first read Robert Black’s “Avian Nutrition” I came across an observation of his that I found interesting. It was something I wanted to know. According to Black, birds will only overeat of one type of food if they are given a restricted diet i.e they are unable to select their food but must eat what they are given and such food is not nutritionally complete. According to Black, if birds are given a variety of live food, they will not over-eat of any one type, say mealworms. Like many keepers of birds, I believed that too much mealworms is bad for the bird and the mealworms should be rationed.

I decided to test what Black said. I offered crickets, suris, mealworms, fish, frogs, and other insects in a buffet so that the birds could choose what they wanted or did not want to eat. I found that Black was right. Given a “cafeteria style diet”, the birds would not overeat of any particular food. They might for a time eat only one type of live food but at other times they might ignore that particular live food completely so that overall, they get a balanced diet. Even with my breeding birds, I found that given a choice of food, the parents may sometimes feed only one type for one or more days, but after that they will feed the other available live food. They appear to instinctively know that they must take a variety from the buffet. Reynolds again appeared to be wrong.

We come next to another point made by Reynolds:


Breeding birds have different nutritional needs for egg production and coping with other stresses related to breeding. Maintaining an adequate plane of nutrition is a must to prevent problems such as egg binding due to insufficient calcium, or improperly developed eggs caused by a lack of certain amino acids required for proper egg development.

So far so good. He then states:


Many breeders believe that certain dietary changes are needed to stimulate breeding in birds. This is simply a myth.

This is a sweeping statement and it contradicts many studies that conclude that diet is an important factor in bringing birds into breeding condition. However, Reynolds again does not tell us the research that supports what he says.


Reynolds then states:


They are overlooking the fact that environmental changes are really the triggers. Extended photo light periods, humidity, temperature and changes in barometric pressure are the triggers for breeding. Since these changes also promote more production of natural foods in the wild, many breeders think that adding fatty foods to their birds' diet will stimulate breeding. This is not necessary and can actually cause problems in fertility due to improper vent contact and egg laying problems due to obesity.

“Today's processed diets are the obvious choice to deliver adequate nutrient levels to our birds” and the rest of the article tries to convince us as to why pr
Lets see what Reynolds is saying. The point he makes is that the availability of more food in the wilds is not an important factor in bringing birds into breeding condition. Really? He again does not state the basis for his statement that contradicts research which conclude that the availability of more food at the start of the breeding season is an important trigger in bringing birds into breeding condition. Reynolds point that adding fatty foods could cause “problems in fertility” is an obvious statement and the breeder must pay the price if he foolishly adds so much fatty food as to cause problems but this has nothing to do with the point Reynolds is making i.e that increase in the availability of food at the start of the breeding season is not an important factor in bringing birds into breeding condition.

Reynolds then comes to the real point of his article, that strong>>ocessed diets are better than natural diets. With the lack of reasoned arguments for his earlier conclusions, I must confess that I had lost further interest in his article.
Comment by NDoan

Hi David,

I believe different author have very different views on certain matter. I believed he is stating his own experiences. I do not agreed with him 100%. However, after reading it a couple of times..........he does have some good point. Please let me explain............and that you are right. Variety is always good........but some hobbyists I know over here in the US.......only feed crickets or mealworms to their birds. What they fed the insects prior to feeding their birds is either carrot or potato only. You see there is a problem here.............and I also have friends who fed their birds only crickets the whole day prior to the breeding season and their birds ignore their dry food.

As for me...........I don't agree on everything I read or believe it to be true..........but I gather the author point of views.........and apply what I think fit my need most.


Comment by Arjan

Posted: Fri Mar 16, 2007 9:02 am Post subject: Shama's

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Hello David

This is very interesting because the first point of Reynolds article is so very true

Proper nutrition in any life form is the base requirement for growth, health and reproduction. ….. Without adequate nutrition no life form can reach its maximum genetic size, optimal immune system function or greatest reproductive ability. Even with superior genetics, advanced husbandry and state of the art disease prevention, sub-adequate nutrition will prevent success.

Health care management begins with nutrition. Approximately 80 percent of all medical problems reported in birds are related in some way to poor nutrition

And this could and should be the basic for a possible very interesting discussion.
Proper nutrition for our soft bills is my daily quest.

Unfortunately we are under the delusion that elaborate cafeteria style diets which satisfy our own egos will be good for our birds. This is not the case. Although birds in the wild instinctively know what to eat, captive birds offered this type of diet will simply eat their favourites few ingredients and leave the rest, while begging for more.

I have to disagree with this statement every living creature has its favourite food. Supply an ice bear on Greenland with honey and he will never go for seals again as long as he gets honey.

The bird does not know if you have a bird who loves mealworms and you feed these in a tremendous account he will eat it till he dies of it. It’s in my believes providing Nature that keeps our birds on a healthy diet.
Over here in Europe we have large changes in seasons our soft bills in the wild have to migrate to warmer areas in Winter or adept to a cold, non insect diet. There are species who even change their Pouch or Stomach. Summer soft for insects, Winter hard and muscular for seeds.

But even in the tropics there are season chances in the Amazon 4, two rain seasons a long and a short one, the same as for the dry seasons. So there is also a change of food applies.

So the soft bills in the Amazon just have to relay on what nature brings and that’s this week a termite explosion next week a Mango tree the week after, the insects coming to the rotting Mango’s etc etc. After that, the supply’s of Mango dries up and he moves on to the next supply of nutrition.

Our Soft bills are the product of Nature and to keep our birds in top condition I believe it would be a good idea to follow Nature and try to even do it better.

For example we have a parrot. I got him 6 weeks old in Suriname, South America, 1975.
A few years ago he got really sick we were afraid he would die. The Vet concluded it was a Nutrition problem because he had his favourite seed Sunflower seeds. She suggested a change to Pallets so he was unable to select his favourite and so we did and our precious family bird is recovered and is now 32 years old and as good as new.

As you know I also feed my soft bills Pallets and I believe I am on a good track with this dry food but this discussion did raise the question for me should we not seek for a four season dry food pallet.

This is an interesting question for the bird food industry.

For insects there is an economic problem over here in Holland
Mealworms are available and cost 12 Euro ‘s a Kilo
Crickets cost 2 Euro’s 20 gram 100 Euro’s a kilo
that is about 130 American Dollars.
You must admit that that is costly so we have to look for other supply’s
We use everything we can lay our hands on for example last year I could buy infected rates off bee’s from a bee keeper I placed these rates in our heated winter shelters and now all kind off insects are coming out off these rates moths fly’s whatever the Shama’s love it. By the way they have a clutch a five eggs.

The Greenhouse is full of flying and crawling insects.
For the rest we provide Morio’s they look like very large mealworms but is a different species so also different nutrition , Shrimps larvae’s of bee’s home made ant eggs made off yoghurt.

larvae’s of fly’s and what we provide we enriched with minerals and vitamins.
Sorry I forgot one very important stage: The enrichment of the food insects because there is also a lot to achieve.

Again it’s getting late so I have to end it.

I just read NDoan’s contribution and I totally agree. Variation is till now the golden Keyword. The next Golden keyword could be variation by Season.

But Nutrition is the Golden keyword to success and beware of Tefal pans.

Comment by David De Souza

Posted: Fri Mar 16, 2007 2:19 pm Post subject: Proper Feeding

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Hi Andy/Arjan,

Thank you for your comments.

I personally believe that it is not feasible to feed captive shamas only live food as we are unable to provide the variety that a bird in the wild will be able to capture and consume and thereby ensure that it has the necessary nutrition. Neither is it feasible to provide only dry food as there is no scientifically prepared food that is available for our birds (especially soft bills) unlike the case with dogs and cats where there have been many years of research and development on their nutritional requirements.

In view of the above, other than during breeding when the birds receive only live food, my birds are fed dry food with live food. The dry food that I use has been commercially available in the local market for more than 30 years. During this time, it has established its reputation as being generally reliable. By also feeding some live food daily, I try to ensure that my birds get the nutrition they need.

My comments on Reynold’s article were meant to emphasise that we should consider carefully the opinions that we receive. The article appeared to contain much misinformation. These were:-

1. That birds in the wild instinctively know what to eat but once they become captive, they somehow lose this ability.

2.That birds fed natural food cannot be fed buffet style but must be fed measured amounts of each type of food to ensure that they receive proper nutrition.

3. Diet is not a factor in stimulating birds to breed.

4. It is sufficient to feed pelleted dry food to the birds.

Whilst I do not dispute Reynold’s point that in countries with 4 seasons, environmental changes are the main triggers in inducing birds to breed, this does not appear to be the case for tropical birds. For such birds the availability of live food may be the most important trigger to stimulate breeding since there is less change in the photo light period and temperature in the tropics. It is true that it is colder during the monsoon rainy season than at other times but it is also true that during the monsoon season, the movements of the birds are more restricted by the rain and they find it more difficult to find food.

As noted by both of you, some of Reynold’s views are correct and these were noted in my post. However, where an article mixes large amounts of misinformation with information that is true, it is impossible for the inexperienced to distinguish between the two and the article may cause more harm than good.

Andy, its not a matter of Reynold having different opinions from those that are prevailing. By all means have different opinions. That's how we learn and progress. In Reynold's case, it wasn't a matter of having an opinion that was different from others. He was passing off speculative views as though they are from the gospel and that is misleading and wrong.

Best regards,

David