A bird who likes to drink!!!

I like to put a splash of unsweetened, organic, 100 percent pure cranberry juice in my water. I would think that would be ok for a bird and even have some health benefits, but I don't know. I thought tomatoes were ok for them too and included them with other veggies while weaning her and then read conflicting info on them. Im not sure I buy the nightshade veggie thing that people claim cause inflammation, but rather be safe than sorry.
 
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Stevia is not artificial, it is taken from a plant: Stevia rebaudiana.
Like we take sugar from reeds, beets and corn.

It just tastes like someting factory made if used in high concentration (horrible aftertaste imho), the plant does not taste too bad (you can buy them in the herbsection).


Very true...I bought my first Stevia plant at a nursery a few years ago, and it's huge now, lives inside my front bay window...Whenever I have tea, I just go and grab a single leaf and drop it in...one leaf is more than enough, and it doesn't leave any kind of "aspartame" like taste, which I hate.

I have caught Kane and Bowie both chewing on the leaves of the Stevia plant, they also chew on my mint plant, my lemon-balm plant, and my lemongrass...My CAV told me that as long as it's something that they do only occasionally (because a lot will make their GI Tracts upset) and as long as I obviously don't use any chemicals or plant foods on them, that it's fine for them to pick at them once in a while when they sneak their way over to the plant...Gotta remember that these are plants that birds in the wild eat every single day, especially the different wild mint plants, lemon balms, etc., as the grow and multiply outside in the wild like a wild-fire spreading, and they're absolutely everywhere, just like most wild herb plants.

Stevia itself contains no real sugar obviously, nor does aspartame, nutrisweet, etc. I'm not at all saying that artificial sweeteners are good for birds, because they're not, actually they aren't good for ANYONE! I don't drink any soda anyway, I wasn't allowed to have it as a kid, so I just don't like it, but it is true that they aren't good for anyone to ingest...

****We also need to remember here in this post that there are many different definitions of the term "real sugar"! Are we talking about plain old, regular, real sugar, as in the stuff that after it's processed looks the same as salt, and comes only from the Sugarcane plant???? OR are we talking about the other natural "sugars" that are found in plants other than Sugarcane, such as from fruit, veggies etc.? These would include Fructose, Sucrose, etc. Lots of these, they are also "Real" sugars, but not "sugarcane"....

I have no idea whether the "Diet" or "Zero" sodas contain ANY types of natural "sugars" at all, or if they only contain the Artificial sweeteners. No idea. But caffeine isn't good for birds in any type of quantities, the same as chocolate isn't...I give my guys a sip of my coffee every once in a while, which won't hurt them (I drink coffee black, so no sugar/sweeteners/milk/cream etc.), but certainly not all the time and not more than a sip or two...

Moderation and using common sense...

Same as giving them a sip of Orange Juice, which is Bowie's absolute favorite...I reserve this for liquid meds....
 
A lot of really good info being put in here!

To the OP - Your idea of cups with lids might not be a bad idea, until you nail down a knack for preventing her from getting to the cups and inside them in the first place. Maybe even then, not a bad idea to keep to, haha!

It also might be really handy when you have guests over, because they may not be used to paying attention to that sort of thing - so this would be another safety net for your sweetie.

I agree wholeheartedly with what the others have said here; even a little bit of the caffeine and fake sugars and other chemicals and ingredients in such drinks are very bad for parrots. They have such tiny bodies and high metabolisms, even what we consider to be a very small amount, is much larger for them.
 
Really enjoyable and helpful thread, everybody.

The Rb likes water with quite a few good shakes of pepper sauce stirred in. The sauce is made of peppers, vinegar and salt. 5-10 shakes into a cup or so of water. I totally forget how I discovered/started this... I'm sure it was 20-30 years ago. He'll dunk his head in it if he gets the chance.
 
So. Birds = water.
Humans = all sorts of artifical or 'natural' drinks,, none of which have any business going down a parrots throat.
 
I agree with noodles123. The dangers may not be obvious. The ingestion of these may result in a shortened lifespan, GI disturbances and other problems the bird will try to hide (It's their nature.), and higher AV bills.

Rather than make your head spin, suffice that in addition to her list, avoid pear juice, undehydrated citrus, nightshade (tomato) relatives including green potatoes, allums (bulbs, onions), processed anything and beans either with red skins (kidney beans) or larger than your thumbnail (quick to cuticle).
 
Hey, this is completely unrelated to your post but I’m new here and I have no idea how to start a thread. So my question is does anyone know what type of Conure this is? I think it’s a green cheek but I honestly have no idea what I’m dealing with here, I bought it off of a breeder and I’m going to pick him up this Friday. Please reply ASAP, thank you.
Here’s a link of the images https://imgur.com/a/L7uNkcf

The breeder didn't tell you? Who is this person? It is a GCC, but the breeder doesn't know?
 
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I like to put a splash of unsweetened, organic, 100 percent pure cranberry juice in my water. I would think that would be ok for a bird and even have some health benefits, but I don't know. I thought tomatoes were ok for them too and included them with other veggies while weaning her and then read conflicting info on them. Im not sure I buy the nightshade veggie thing that people claim cause inflammation, but rather be safe than sorry.
The easiest way to tell Nightshades are to look at the seeds. Round, flat, encased/wet seeds mean no. For example, avoid ground cherries aka golden berries. Round, flat, dry seeds mean yes. For example, peppers both hot and sweet are good. Keep in mind that this is very general! There are actually more direct ways to tell.
 
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The easiest way to tell Nightshades are to look at the seeds. Round, flat, encased/wet seeds mean no. For example, avoid ground cherries aka golden berries. Round, flat, dry seeds mean yes. For example, peppers both hot and sweet are good. Keep in mind that this is very general! There are actually more direct ways to tell.
I am very confused, and I'm afraid my husband will be more so! Our Blue front Amazon likes to eat almost anything. Lately she's been wanting tomatoes as we had a lot of tomatoes this summer and I had no idea they were supposed to be bad, but she has no health problems. And I just read that kidney beans are bad. But she loves chili and we put kidney beans in our chili and one of the goffins likes them too, and there are tomatoes in the chili. The birds are fine, their poop is fine, so I don't understand why these ingredients are considered bad for parrots.
 
I am very confused, and I'm afraid my husband will be more so! Our Blue front Amazon likes to eat almost anything. Lately she's been wanting tomatoes as we had a lot of tomatoes this summer and I had no idea they were supposed to be bad, but she has no health problems. And I just read that kidney beans are bad. But she loves chili and we put kidney beans in our chili and one of the goffins likes them too, and there are tomatoes in the chili. The birds are fine, their poop is fine, so I don't understand why these ingredients are considered bad for parrots.
Here is a list of safe & toxic ingredients that has lots of great info:

Bird Safe Fresh Foods & Toxic Food Lists + Sprouts
 

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