I have a huge garden setup at my mother's house. I grow all sorts of vegetables, but not this year due to the drought, just tomatoes and green beans. Normally, I do tomatoes, green beans, zucchini, butternut squash, pumpkins, chili peppers, strawberries, carrots and potatoes. The harvest isn't really that large, so the birds get a majority of it and I do it all naturally.

When it comes out, I'm going to get this hive for my tiny house. It's pretty expensive, but I think it will be worth it in the long run. You should watch the video to get the jist of it.

http://www.honeyflow.com/

I have a bunch of flowerpots on my back porch with "cockatiel salad" greens growing in them. No need for pesticides or herbicides since we don't have a lot of bugs in the desert and I keep the frickin' ground squirrels out by putting a wire cage over everything.

I have a pomegranate tree that's been producing fruit for years, and I planted two new ones in the fall that so far don't look like they're going to do anything this year. The cockatiels will only eat dehydrated pomegranate arils but Dweezil likes them fresh so I'm looking forward to this year's crop.

That hive looks interesting. I'll show it to my husband!

please feel free to discuss the topic. It's interesting.

To be perfectly honest Steph in general the majority of us here are inappropriate.

We do have that tendency to stray off topic however. If you look at some old threads most of them end with something completely different from the original question.

I only use green leafy veggie for the tiels - I just don't know how to give them something else (peppers? tomatoes?). In our tiel list: kale, spinach, collards, broccoli, parsley, beet greens, that's pretty much it. I try to buy organic or on the farmers market during the season.
Would someone tell me how to serve for example zucchini? bell peppers? uhm...cucumbers? just to cut a piece and attach to the cage? Or should I grate it? chop? do they like carrots?

so... back to the pellet conversation. I wonder if other manufacturers just don't mention use of GMO ingredients... do they have to? how about ZuPreem? I stopped feed their pellets because of the sugar.

Bluekeet, I found a good profession for you, as you are the one just out of high school. Why don't you become a biologist and study for us all that bee and butterfly problems? wouldn't be interesting and worth it?

by the way, which Nutriberries could you guys recommend? I am thinking to order Avi-cakes

I think it's an appropriate topic because it relates to what is and is not safe to feed our birds. There's a lot of emotion related to the organic versus conventional debate and the GMO issue, because it seems like organic OUGHT to be better and GMO OUGHT to be bad. But the available evidence indicates that there's very little difference between them. Organic is slightly better in some ways and conventional is slightly better in others, but overall they're pretty much the same. Which means that you're free to pick whichever one you prefer for whatever reason you prefer. If you think organic tastes better or if it just makes you feel better then by all means go for that. If you think conventional looks better and has a better price, there's no reason not to go for it. ALL produce should be washed carefully to get rid of any residues on the surface, because both types can have nasty stuff on the outer surface.

Tomatoes and green peppers aren't particularly desirable to give to birds because they're members of the nightshade family (Solanaceae) which contain toxic alkaloids. It's OK to give these foods to your birds in moderate amounts, but there's no need to actively encourage your birds to eat them. There are lots of other veggies out there that provide similar nutrients with fewer toxins. As mentioned earlier, 99.9% of the toxins in conventionally grown produce was produced by the plant itself. All plants contain toxins/carcinogens so we can't escape from the undesirable chemicals, but we can choose the plant foods that have lower levels of the undesirable stuff.

Sounds nice, but I would rather work with birds, horses or reptiles directly.

I was thinking either I work with the birds at the Sacramento Zoo, work at training horses around here or work at the reptile store here.