Today, I couldn't let Lucy be out of her cage as much as I'd like, because I'm watching a dog for a family friend of ours, who likes to chase birds, and has less control over himself about it than my dog does. On top of that, because this dog is a troublemaker, and I'm alone at the house while my parents are in Virginia for my grandmother's funeral, I have to keep an eye on him, so alone time with Lucy is out of the question (she did have some time out of the cage though, while the dogs were outside).

But at one point, she was in her cage, and I was eating a bagel for lunch, and Lucy could clearly see me from in her cage. She started eating as well, and after a minute of watching her eat, it hit me.

She was eating out of her pellet bowl.

While that bowl is usually taken out for her to share mealtime with me, I leave it in there otherwise, in case she ever decides she wants some, on her own time.

I guess now she just associates the pellets with eating with me, no matter where she is. I thought she would have gone for the seeds, in this case, since she had access to them.

That's pretty cool! And an easy way to get her to eat her pellets.

How sweet!

and then she will be asking how to lose weight

Nice! Very proud of you guys. Made it a long way!

We really have gone a long way. When I got Lucy, she wanted nothing to do with me. Now, she doesn't want to leave me alone.

Every once in a while, I see her eat the pellets on her own, from inside the cage. I don't need to coax her into eating them anymore, luckily. However, I still like to take her out to share a meal. She eats her pellets that way too, and she seems to enjoy it a lot. It's kind of a tradition now, and despite having her own food, she still likes to steal mine.

what pellets do you use?

I use Zupreem natural diet for cockatiels. Carolyn said that her cockatiels like that brand, and since Lucy came from her, I thought it would be convenient, since she was already familiar. For whatever reason though, they name it "Zupreem natural medium bird food" on the petsmart website, which is weird, because cockatiels are considered "small" birds, and Zupreem actually has a different kind of pellet food under that same name.
http://www.petsmart.com/bird/food/zupre ... m%3Dsearch

I may or may not try Lafeber or Roudybush at some point in the future though. I'm not entirely sure what Lucy likes specifically, and while she'll eat the zupreem pellets, she doesn't seem to be too excited about having them. I've heard some good things about Roudybush, so I might go for that one.

Roudybush will send you samples if you ask on their website.
I am using "crumbles" size.

Most of my birds refused to eat Roudybush crumble, but that was before Lucy's time. I'm thinking about trying them out on the small Roudybush pellet sometime because they might like the shape of that better. Birds are odd, they're driven more by size, texture and color than by taste.

My flock also doesn't like Hagen Tropican. Stuff they DO like: Zupreem Natural, Zupreem Fruitblend, Harrisons, Mazuri, Caitec Oven Fresh Bites and of course the overwhelming favorite, Nutriberries. I've never tried Lafeber pellets. They also liked Higgins Intune but the size of the pellet was a little more than they could handle, so I had to cut the pellets in half which was a major hassle. So no more of that brand unless they come out with a budgie size.