When comparing bird food products, it’s important to know about the ingredients you want to avoid feeding your birds for their well being. Here’s a short list, and a brief explanation of why you may want to stop feeding your birds all foods that contain these ingredients.
.
I invite you to open this link to chart,
“Bird Food Ingredients to Avoid” ,
then as you read the information below,
you can compare pellets, seeds, other sprouting blends, fruits, vegetables and nuts,
as you become aware of the foods you feed
that may contain some of these ingredients that are best avoided.
.
1. Unhealthy carbohydrates
‘Bad carb’ foods are highly processed and are high in calorie density. This means that when we, or our birds, eat these foods we must eat large volumes of food in order to feel full. This food volume contains excessive amounts of calories. They are packed filled with refined, highly processed grains like white flour with refined processed sugars, these can include white sugar, cane syrup, corn syrup or molasses. Bad carb foods lack essential nutrients vital for good health, and are often high in added salt, saturated fats, cholesterol and trans fats.
.
2. Excess Omega-6 essential fatty acids
Numerous published studies link the over consumption of foods high in O-6 (omega-6) fatty acids to numerous chronic inflammatory disease conditions such as nonalcoholic fatty liver disease, cardiovascular disease, obesity, inflammatory bowel disease, rheumatoid arthritis, and Alzheimer’s disease. (1)(2)
.
3. Pesticides
Volumes have been written on the damaging health effects from pesticides. Here’s a link to a page on our website that explains the problems linked to pesticides and non-organic foods.
.
4. Soy, in all forms.
In July, 2017, I began researching the pros and cons of soy. I also learned that the Soy Industry, is so huge, that it has put magazines and other publications “Out Of Business”! Because publishers printed articles that even hinted at anti-soy information and published studies showing that soy caused diseases, instead of preventing them. So, instead of writing on soy, I wrote around the subject. And, wrote a series of articles, published in my monthly column, “The Holistic Parrot”, in Parrots magazine, on phytoestrogens (hormones in plants), xenoestrogens (chemicals that mimic estrogen in the body) and foods that can neutralize xenoestrogens in the body. FYI, soy is PACKED with phytoestrogens. And xenoestrogens are horribly abundant in our environment.
In the future I will put together an article (or book) that will include all the information on soy my research uncover. But until then, if you would like to read what I wrote on phytoestrogens and xenoestrogens you can visit the Parrots website (using the link below) and purchase these back issues.
This article series was published in Parrots magazine.
Issues: September, 2017, #236, ‘Phytoestrogens’
October, 2017, # 237, ‘Xenoestrogens’, and the
November, 2017, # 238, ‘Foods that can neutralize xenoestrogens’
Resources
(1) ‘Health Implications of High Dietary Omega-6 Polyunsaturated Fatty Acids’, E Patterson, R Wall, GF Fitzgerald, RP Ross and C Stanton, Journal of Nutrition and Metabolism, 2012.
(2) “The importance of the ratio of omega-6/omega-3 essential fatty acids”, The Center for Genetics, Nutrition and Health, Washington, DC 20009, USA. Biomedical & Pharmacotherapy, 2002 Oct;56(8):365-79.
Please share your thoughts or questions and post a comment.
