Aussie Finch Forum

Hello all sorghum seed is favourite for gourds in the wild, anyone feed sorghum to captive goulds,,I tried they weren't interested.. They kept eating there finch mix

Hi Paul,that's because gouldians are so domesticated they wouldn't know what sorgum seed was but doesn't hurt to have a bit of variety of wild seeds to tempt them. Craig

Hi paul 1966 I try these seed about 15 year go and my wont even look at it,because our Gouldian are so domestic to the seed what we give them,I believe our Gouldian so spoilt to seed we give them and what Craig said I totally agree with him .

Cheer from Mr Tino

Paul,
They need to know what it is first, just chucking some in the cage and expecting them to start eating it is a bit much. Also try it very young while at the start of the milk. Also todays commercial varieties have been bred for size, some of the earlier ones from 15-20 years ago were much smaller and a could be handled by most finches. I use sorghum when available in milk and they devour it, but they are also used to sprays of green seed.

Don't give up

Don't forget there are many species of sorghum. According to Teidmann (1996) the species taken by wild Gouldians are Sorghum stipoideum, S. plumosum, S. intrans and, to a lesser extent, S. australiens. The mature grain commercial sorghum (Sorghum bicolour) is far too big for most finches so there is no chance they will try it but there are many wild types including Johnson Grass (Sorghum halpense) are eaten by Gouldians. Wild species have shattering headed (i.e. they drop their seed at maturity) so growing them in commercial quantities is difficult. Silk sorghum is hybrid of between Johnsons grass and the commercial species and is grown as a forage crop but its seed small are retained at maturity and are included in Mike Fidler's mix for his gouldians.

Sprouted or green they go for it. Too hard dry.