So on the Parrot forum someone asked about a diet for their African ringneck and I told them what I feed Mango because they are similar species and I said I give him seed for breakfast on weekdays and other stuff I feed him and then another member Wolf replied and said seed is just as bad as eating ice cream for breakfast and that its unhealthy and has too much protein.I dont believe this for one second I know some seeds do have protein like my seed has peanuts.And cockatiels are supposed to have seed in their diet as well as other parrot species and I know its unhealthy to have an all seed diet but seed for breakfast thats nothing.What your opinions on this? Also another member Pajarita does not recommend pellets at all they are bad as she says because she feeds her birds what is known as Gloop.And Wolf and Pajarita are supposed to be the most experienced on the forum lol they are always talking crap there like remember Pajarita kept on telling me Rio is in pain he is sexually frustrated you need to get him a mate and now where is Rio today? He is alone he has a owner all to himself and he is happy.

Actually seeds are too low in protein! They have a good total amount of amino acids but they don't have enough methionine or lysine to turn it into a complete protein. This is why pellet companies add beans/legumes like soy or peanuts to their formula. It helps provide the missing amino acids so the bird gets more complete protein out of it.

I have an article on the nutritional value of seeds, nuts and grains at http://www.littlefeatheredbuddies.com/i ... seeds.html They provide a lot of important nutrients but there are some that they lack. Vitamin A is a biggie that seeds are lacking in.

I also have an insanely long article on pellets that you already know about lol. http://www.littlefeatheredbuddies.com/i ... llets.html There are good reasons for not feeding an all-pellet diet but "they're bad for birds" isn't one of them. They're monotonous and low on foraging value which is the main reason that an all-pellet diet isn't recommended. There's a lot of psychological value in eating a variety of foods.

P.S. A study on cockatiels found that they did just fine on a diet of up to 70% protein. The protein level in seeds and pellets is nowhere near that. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11435523

Thanks ill make sure to read those in the morning.

Don't sunflower/safflower seeds have more protein than millet? I feel like different kinds of seeds might have different amounts of protein.

Millet is actually pretty crappy when it comes to protein lol. Take a look at the fourth and fifth lines of this chart: http://www.littlefeatheredbuddies.com/i ... seeds1.jpg It tells the total protein in grams (which is actually the total amino acids not the total complete protein - a lot of those AAs are superfluous). And it also gives the amino acid score from SELFNutritionData, which is an indicator of the quality of the protein (meaning the completeness of the amino acids). Millet has only 11 g of protein per 100 g of seed, and the amino acid score is 38 which is the lowest on the page. Sunflower has 21 g of protein and an amino acid score of 88, which is a lot better. It's also considerably higher in calories, so there's a tradeoff. Safflower is lower in calories than sunflower but it's also lower in protein, vitamin E, and B vitamins.

I haven't been able to figure out exactly how their amino acid scoring system works. It's not based on a scale of 1 to 100, because I've seen scores as high as 144 (for beef steak). I don't know exactly how much complete protein is in sunflower, but the amino acids are better than most of the seeds on the chart. I know what the limiting amino acid is too - it's lysine. "Limiting amino acid" means the one that you run out of first when you're putting together complete protein with the amino acids on hand. So if you offer another food that's got some extra lysine in it, it will combine with the AAs in the rest of the diet and help you get more complete protein out of the sunflower. Safflower is even shorter on lysine than sunflower is, so it has an amino acid score of only 65.

Here's the Self Nutrition listing for sunflower: http://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/nut ... cts/3076/2 I always hit the little dropdown box that lets you change the amount to 100 grams, so when I compare stuff everything is in the same units. It has a little black and purple "protein quality" graph showing you that the lysine is limited but the difference isn't too bad. Further down on the page if you click "more details" under Protein & Amino Acids, it will tell you exactly how much of everything there is.

Here's the listing for millet: http://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/cer ... sta/5701/2 It's WAY low on the lysine, which is why its amino acid score is so bad.

BTW the essential amino acids for birds aren't exactly the same as the ones for humans. I don't remember offhand what the difference is, but there's one that's essential for humans that isn't essential for birds, and one that's essential for birds that isn't essential for humans.

True, but I would think one would also have to take in account how much protein the bird in question needs, and how much would be considered "too much" for said bird. I'll have to look more into that...

It's been demonstrated that cockatiels can handle a diet of 70% protein for 11 months without problems. The amount of protein in seed and pellets doesn't come anywhere near that, so I don't think we need to worry. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11435523

I made a new chart last night that gives protein scores for a few common seeds, a few common beans, and egg. The big surprise is that soybeans provide as much or more complete protein as egg: http://www.littlefeatheredbuddies.com/i ... seeds3.jpg

My birds eat mung bean sprouts they love them.

Any kind of beans in the diet will help provide more complete protein, which is good because seeds don't provide that much all by themselves.

Zorro gets lil seed n pellets with veggies n fruit n nuts