Unfinished pellet food

[Azalea]

If your birds don't finish their pellets, but the food is "clean" (no waste or feathers), how long do you leave it there? Do you add a little more at next feeding time, or change all of it every morning/night, no matter what?

[Ira]

I usually change it every morning, but then my four have the amazing ability to make their bowls grubby, if not by fouling the food then by doing goodness knows what to the rims of the bowls. I don't tend to have much left, though, if anything, depending on which pellet I'm feeding. I've worked out over time roughly what they'll eat in a day.

[Loz]

I change the bowls around every two-three days but like Ira's gang, my guys usually force me to change a few bowls each day thanks to "accidents".

Bear in mind. I do have fourteen food bowls to check each morning. I might reduce down to twelve though. I need to cut down on waste!

[Hezz]

I top up what is left which isn’t usually much and my guys keep their bowls clean.

[Marianne Marlow]

How do they manage to keep the bowls clean?

Mine seem to wander though eachother droppings and then step on the bowls and cover the rims with droppings. There are also random droppings in some of the bowls.

Oct 7, 2023 0:59:10 GMT Hezz said:

I top up what is left which isn’t usually much and my guys keep their bowls clean.

[Ira]

Criswell's theory confirmed, Australian budgies are better behaved.
Mine can't even seem to keep their perches clean lately. I swear Pippin is crushing pellets in his beak and then licking the dust all over them.

[Loz]

There is nowhere in the entire house that I cannot find a bit of sweetcorn or a dropping. Or some other budgie-created clean-up situation.

[Azalea]

With our Budgies, one or both food bowls will be clean sometimes. No real way of predicting it.

One of the Cockatiels does "bathroom business" in the food bowl every single night. I always need to clean it in the morning.

Our Sun Conure's food bowl is clean most of the time. Maybe an occasional feather or chewed piece of something from a toy. However, her water is dirty more often.

[Loz]

Oct 7, 2023 10:04:34 GMT Azalea said:

With our Budgies, one or both food bowls will be clean sometimes. No real way of predicting it.

One of the Cockatiels does "bathroom business" in the food bowl every single night. I always need to clean it in the morning.

Our Sun Conure's food bowl stays clean most of the time. Maybe an occasional feather or chewed piece of something from a toy. However, she gets her water dirty more often.

I used to get dirty bowls every single night. I then rethought my strategy.
Originally I had the bowls placed slightly higher than the perches as I felt this might reduce the chances of soiled food. I worked out though that the higher bowls were more attractive as roosting spots than the lower perches. The results should have been predictable.
I now have the bowls slightly lower than the perches, which means perches are preferred roosting spots and the bowls are more often clean in the morning.

Can your cockatiel's setup be adjusted to reduce the chances of a soiled food bowl in the night?

[Azalea]

Oct 7, 2023 10:12:57 GMT loz said:

Oct 7, 2023 10:04:34 GMT Azalea said:

With our Budgies, one or both food bowls will be clean sometimes. No real way of predicting it.

One of the Cockatiels does "bathroom business" in the food bowl every single night. I always need to clean it in the morning.

Our Sun Conure's food bowl stays clean most of the time. Maybe an occasional feather or chewed piece of something from a toy. However, she gets her water dirty more often.

I used to get dirty bowls every single night. I then rethought my strategy.
Originally I had the bowls placed slightly higher than the perches as I felt this might reduce the chances of soiled food. I worked out though that the higher bowls were more attractive as roosting spots than the lower perches. The results should have been predictable.
I now have the bowls slightly lower than the perches, which means perches are preferred roosting spots and the bowls are more often clean in the morning.

Can your cockatiel's setup be adjusted to reduce the chances of a soiled food bowl in the night?

I might try that arrangement (bowls a little below perches). It doesn't really bother me to clean the bowl, though (my comment might have sounded that way). I've had jobs where I cleaned various messes made by teenage/adult humans. At least the Cockatiels are not blatantly disrespectful and inconsiderate!

[Loz]

Azalea - excellent point about teenagers

I don't think any of us really minds cleaning up after our birbs, it's all a part of the care package we supply.
Although my kakariki, Chocobo, likes to push the envelope on that

[Azalea]

Haha, yes...but after working in multiple stores, I've seen the worst things done by people who looked older than 30.

[tweetiepiesmom]

I clean the bowl with pellets everyday. They always seem to get feathers or poop in them.

[Hezz]

Oct 7, 2023 8:24:19 GMT Marianne Marlow said:

How do they manage to keep the bowls clean?

Mine seem to wander though eachother droppings and then step on the bowls and cover the rims with droppings. There are also random droppings in some of the bowls.

Oct 7, 2023 0:59:10 GMT Hezz said:

I top up what is left which isn’t usually much and my guys keep their bowls clean.

Well bred?! I’ve no idea why but they don’t sit on the edge of the bowls except to feed; perches are much more comfortable.

The messiest place is naturally where Loki has his fresh food but his pellets end up all over the house due to his propensity to fit as many of his pellets into his beak as possible, find me and then proceed to eat/drop them as he unloads the extras to hold with his foot and then eats them one at a time.