Nutritional errors...it remains a problem
Please note: this case file contains shocking images, but unfortunately it is the harsh reality...
Feeding mistakes casefile 5,
Junk food day, a dubious celebration of food that should not be called food but for us the perfect time to reflect on nutritional mistakes.
When it comes to welfare problems, behavioral problems, health problems and mortality at a young age, eating junk food by parrots/birds is still number 1.
Structural nutritional errors are determined by nutritional deficiencies but also by an excess of unhealthy additives. Comparable to the insane sugar additives and too high salt levels in the diet for humans/children.
In addition, parrots/birds also have the risks of non-organic feeding, where insecticides/biocides or agricultural poisons are the cause of (chronic) poisoning symptoms. These risks are similar to getting Parkinson's disease in people who are exposed to agricultural toxins such as those used in floriculture.
Prof. P. Zwart has already scientifically demonstrated in 1979 that feeding seeds to parrots/birds is a reason for serious nutritional deficiencies as a reason for abnormalities of the mucous membranes, skin, organs and immune system. These abnormalities are linked to a deficiency of Vitamin A. Knowing that seed mixtures are responsible for more than 30 nutritional deficiencies makes it clear why feeding seed mixtures is even worse than eating at McDonalds every day and/or smoking a pack of cigarettes a day.
The fact that the life expectancy of birds in the Netherlands corresponds to the life expectancy of humans in the Middle Ages is more than shocking. It's outrageous. The knowledge has been known for decades, but no one cares.
It also shows that veterinary medicine has failed in every way and continues to fail. At the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine in Utrecht, veterinary students graduate without any idea of the primary welfare requirements of parrots/birds and without the idea that birds can be happy if they live longer than 30% of their life expectancy.
In this respect, pet shops still play a negative role because owners simply assume that they sell food that is in the interest of the birds.
On this point, the Dutch Society for the Protection of Birds (VBN) has also gone completely off the rails by promoting and selling the year-round feeding of non-organic seeds to birds in gardens for many years. In 2022, I demonstrated that VBN's seed mixtures contain several insecticides. This has been demonstrated again in 2024 and in 2025 by the Pesticides Action Network (PAN), but the Dutch Society for the Protection of Birds continues to poison birds and nature, including insects. Insects that are crucial for nature and for insectivores,
Both captive birds and birds in the wild are constantly subject to (commercial) interests other than the interests, welfare and health of the birds.
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