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The Canary's Nest
Articles for further questions do not hesitate to call at (757) 467-2333 or email Marvin
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Supplements in the drinking water or on the softfood/eggfood, pros and cons. If supplements are going to work it is important that you deliver them to your birds in the most effective way. Incorrect supplementation can give a false sense of security to owners who often think they are doing the right thing. This page is designed to explain why we prefer on-food supplements over those that go in the drinking water. There are three key problems with supplementing birds through their drinking water. Firstly, because most people are quite wasteful with water, it is generally the most expensive method. Often more supplements are thrown away than consumed! Secondly there are some key ingredients that cannot be added to water for technical reasons. For example the amino acid methionine is very smelly in drinking water, good quality complete proteins will not dissolve and many herbal extracts are not soluble. So we simply cannot put the all the ingredients we would like into water-borne supplements. In particular the nutrients required for quick moults, good feather quality and improved breeding performance are all difficult to supply in the water. Thirdly supplements in water provide nutritional benefits for germs as well as for your birds so can actually cause illness. This last issue is easy to solve with the addition of a water sanitizer. So from a purely nutritional point of view I support the use of on-food supplements. Having said that there are often good management reasons for using supplements in water. It is often quicker for busy bird keepers to mix a water bottle than to prepare eggfood or chop up lots of fruit and vegetables. And of course many birds will not eat anything but a plain seed diet. For these birds supplementing in the water is far better than no supplement at all. |
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Last updated: January 20, 2008 ©2003- 2008 - The Canary's Nest |
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