I was thinking about trying to bring  some more stuff to replicate the birds natural diet.  Winkipedia (haha I know its a bit plop but I use it as an example) says (editing by me):

A fresh mix...bal blah..... grains and cereals, Edible blossoms and flowers such as Carnations, chamomile, chives, dandelion, daylily, eucalyptus, fruit tree's blossoms, herbs' blossoms, hibiscus, honeysuckle, impatiens, lilac, nasturtiums, pansies, passion flower (passifloræ),..... Wild harvested greens and weeds such as Bromus, chickweeds, cocksfoot or orchard grasses, dandelions, dogstooth, elymus, fescues, marram grasses, milk thistles, oats and wild oats, plantain (the weed), poa genus (i.e. Blue, Meadow's, Spear, Tussock grasses) are also given.

Some of the stuff here is feasible to be grown from seed.  I'd like to do it as a hobby/novelty.  Does anyone have any advice or experience?

I was really staggered when Milky flew off.  She was a proper sunflower fiend and she seems to have dropped it in an instant to eat flower buds.  At one point her 'fella' was eating from my outside bowl while she ate the yellow flowers in the background.

I tried to sprout seeds but they went really manky very fast before sprouting, I was using 'high quality seed' as suggested and keeping it warm and moist.  I made some particularly furry mould. One USA site said before prepping to serve, sprouted seed sshould be washed in a 1:100 dilution of domestic bleach (sic).  Again, any advice or experience?

His diet at the minute is OK (its better than mine and as instructed by this site) but I want to see him pulling the heads off flowers.

 

 

There's something that you can use to inhibit mould growth in sprouting seeds and it's safe for birds - I wouldn't risk the bleach. I'll see if I can find out what it is.

Thanks! I'm using fresh versions of the seed in the mix ( sunflowers etc) but I'm not seeing any shoots. I think the quality of seed food out here is fairly poor. I ate some to test and it seemed ok but you don't know how long its been on the shelf. Tasted seedy.

Seems amazing that a company as big as Trill would suggest their Parrot Mix (looks like budgie food with sunflowers in) is an all-in food for macaws. I'm staggered they haven't been taken to Trade Descriptions.

I found packets of grow your own seeds (veg, flowers etc), just trying to establish whats in the safe list. Apparently the buttons from my polo shirts are in the safe list.

I'll keep looking for the fungal inhibitor - not found it yet. I read somewhere if your seed doesn't sprout that it's poor quality - as you say, been around too long. Tidymix does do a boiling/sprouting mix that we've used for our 2 CAGs. Although they have lately taken to refusing it - typical CAGs.

I wouldn't recommend the polo shirt btw - I suspect it might turn out a bit stringy

You can get window sill pot to grow sprowting seeds from garden centres , free draining you must rinse your seeds twice a day.

If you cant get your hands on one of these , a glass jar with some muslim over the top held on with a rubber band. soak your seeds over night first . then like i said rinse twice a day and keep wam they will sprout faster in a dark place.

Oops, dyslexia strikes again! I think you mean muslin Amanda lol. Although Ian should have no trouble getting hold of the other

Oh, and I use kitchen roll rather than fabric, but the rest applies.

I've found it! It's called 'Safe-sprout' by Avi-med. Here's the link to Rob Harvey's site:

http://shop.robharvey.com/avi-med-s...-186-p.asp

Hope that helps!