To keep your budgies happy and healthy, you need to feed them with the right foods. The birds love fruits, veggies, seeds, and nuts. Strawberries are one of the fruits you may consider feeding them. But are they safe for your budgie?
Can budgies eat strawberries? Yes, budgies can eat strawberries. The birds love these delicious fruits, and introducing them to their diet will make them happy. The fruit is also packed with multiple nutrients the bird needs for good health. But note that you should only feed this fruit moderately due to its high natural sugar content, which can cause health issues to your bird.
Discover everything you need to know about feeding strawberries to your pet bird correctly in the following guide and precautions to observe to avoid harming your bird’s health.
Can you feed strawberries to budgies?
You can feed strawberries to your budgies. The fruits are 100% safe for the parakeets and are part of their healthy varied diet. The fresh fruit is naturally soft and sweet. But more importantly, it is packed with essential nutrients that ensure the bird’s heath.
But just because we’ve said this fruit is safe for the birds doesn’t mean you should just feed them the strawberries just like that. You need to take certain precautions to ensure you do it correctly.
For instance, strawberries contain a high sugar content. You should feed them moderately to your birds to avoid overwhelming their small bodies with excess sugars, which can result in health issues like obesity, diabetes, and diarrhea.
You’ll also need to prepare the strawberries before feeding them to the budgies. This is where you simply remove the undesired parts that may cause issues to your parakeets.
Also worth keeping in mind is that your birds might change the color of their droppings, and you may notice red color. This is perfectly okay and not cause for alarm. It shouldn’t leave you panicked or worried.
Do Budgies Like strawberries?
Budgies like strawberries. They’re tasteful, and the wild and domesticated budgies will love them. As we have said, these birds love sweet treats, and strawberry, a delicious fruit, is one of the fruit they’ll not turn away from.
Sometimes your bird might not show interest in strawberries. The budgie might look scared when you introduce the fruit into its cage. In this case, you don’t have to feel worried.
You can try feeding the fruit for a couple more days. If the bird completely ignores it, don’t force them on him anymore. Move on to other fruits and vegetables that your bird likes.
Every budgie has its preferences, and it’s not a must that he/she eats each and every fruit you throw in her cage.
Health benefits for budgies eating strawberries
Strawberries, like most other fruits safe for budgies, are packed with minerals, vitamins, and antioxidants that enhance your bird’s overall health and wellbeing. They’re also a good source of water that your bird needs to stay hydrated.
Here’s a rundown of the top health benefits offered by strawberries:
Vitamin C
Vitamin c is essential for a healthy immune system. And strawberries are one of the fruits high in Vitamin C available today. Thus, feeding your budgies this fruit will help them combat illness and maintain overall wellbeing.
Potassium
Though not abundant as vitamin C above, potassium is also present in these fruits. It’s essential for helping the birdies with fluid balance, muscle contractions, and nerve signals.
Calcium
Calcium has a great reputation for maintaining bone strength not just in humans but also in your budgies. The calcium in these fruits will help keep your budgie’s bones strong and healthy.
Protein
Strawberries are also a good source of proteins. These are essential for your parakeets’ muscle strength. Budgie’s diet without proteins will make it weak to stand on its perch. This nutrient also helps your bird feel and stops it from overheating, which can result in digestive issues.
Fiber
Strawberries contain fibers. Adding the fruit’s leafy stalk and seeds to your bird’s diet increases fiber content. Needless to say, this high roughage is essential for aiding your bird with digestion and bowel regularity.
How many strawberries should budgies eat?
As we have mentioned before, you should feed strawberries to your budgies moderately and not make it a staple diet for the birds. Like most other fruits, strawberries should be more of an occasional treat for parakeets.
This is because the carbohydrates in strawberries are mainly natural sugars (fructose). Besides, the fruit also carries salicylic acid. These two can be toxic to your bird if you feed it with unlimited pieces of strawberries.
That said, we recommend feeding strawberries to your buddies once or twice every week. You should also give the birds not more than 1-2 strawberries for each feeding session.
Something else you should remember is to remove any leftover strawberries after your birds have eaten to their fill. Some pet owners think it’s okay to leave the fruit inside so that birds can resume eating later on when they get hungry.
However, the fruit tends to go off after being in the open air for long. The water content in it evaporates, and it might taste differently. Bacteria may also get attracted to the fruit surface due to its high sugar content.
Feeding such a fruit might make the bird sick.
Get rid of the leftovers every time, and make a point of feeding fresh strawberries to your budgies whenever you want to treat them to this bird healthy snack.
How do you prepare strawberries for budgies?
Proper preparation of strawberries for budgies is important to ensure you feed your birds just the right parts of the fruits and keep their health in check.
Follow these simple steps to prepare the fruits the right way:
Wash the fruit first
All fruits and veggies are highly likely to be sprayed with pesticides. However, this isn’t something good for your budgie’s delicate system. Unless you’re using organic strawberries, make sure you must clean the fruit thoroughly to eliminate the toxic chemicals before feeding the fruit to your budgie.
Chop it into small pieces
Next, you want to cut the fruit into small pieces. This will give your birds an easy feeding experience for the fruit, given that they have a small beak, and large pieces can overwhelm them.
Serve the fruit
Finally, give the fruits to the birds. Sometimes your little cuties can be afraid of the color red that dominates the fruit. In this case, you can get creative and mix the fruit with greens or fresh vegetables like cucumber, broccoli, savoy cabbage, etc.
IMPORTANT: Ensure you keep flies away from the fruits as they can cause illness to your birds. Remember the food from the cage if your birds haven’t eaten it within a few hours to prevent them from drying out or rotting due to exposure to open air.
Can you feed strawberries to baby budgies?
Yes, you can feed strawberries to baby budgies. However, keep in mind that the young ones are smaller and have tiny beaks. Thus, whatever you give them must be finely chopped to make it easy for them to eat. You may also consider mixing it with other nutritional foods.
For instance, you can give them finely chopped strawberries mixed with other veggies and fruits that are safe for budgies to eat. If preparing fruits with big seeds, be sure to get rid of all of them to avoid overwhelming the young budgie’s beak with them.
In addition to that, you should observe the preparation process for strawberries for budgies, as we have just discussed in our previous section. This will ensure you feed them correctly.
And don’t forget to limit how many strawberries you feed to your beloved bird to prevent potential side effects that arise from the birds consuming too much of these fruits.
Video of a budgie eating strawberries
Below is a video of a cutie budgie enjoying her treat of strawberry
Related questions (FAQ):
Yes, you can feed the top and seeds of a strawberry to your budgie. The seeds of this fruit are simply attached to its skin (the small pores you see on its kin are essentially its seeds). They’re 100% healthy and will not cause any issues to your bird’s health. You can even give your bird the top green part if you want.
Give your budgie 1-2 strawberries once or twice weekly as a healthy treat/snack. If you give them more than this, the bird’s body will not enjoy the benefits offered by this fruit. Instead, you may subject them to health issues like obesity, stomach upsets, and even diarrhea.
Start with half the fruit if you’re feeding your budgie a strawberry for the first time. Cut it into small amounts and provide it in small quantities. Give them the first quarter and see how their body responds to the fruit. Check if their stool gets runny, and try adding some fiber to their diet.
Yes, budgies can eat whole strawberries. These fruits are naturally soft, and the birds can tear them apart on their own. You don’t necessarily need to cut them like other fruits or veggies. However, the birds might appreciate you cutting the fruit into small pieces to make them easy to eat. If you’re feeding a baby budgie, chopping the fruit into smaller pieces is highly advisable.
Final Verdict
Strawberries are 100% safe fruit to feed your birds. But more importantly, they’re highly nutritional and make a good, occasional tasty treat for your birds. They contain essential nutrients like vitamin C, potassium, calcium, proteins, and fiber, which help promote your budgies’ health and overall wellbeing.
You should avoid feeding too many strawberries to your birds, though. Limit this fruit treat to 1-2 days a week and give the birds not more than 1-2 strawberries per feeding session. The fruits contain fructose and salicylic acid, which can be toxic to your bird if consumed in high amounts.
Follow our advice above on the proper preparation of strawberries before feeding them to your little feathered friends to ensure you keep them healthy.
Do you know if your budgies can eat lettuce or celery? Read our articles about it to learn more.
