The popularity of keeping pet birds as well as feeding the wild birds in your area in your backyard or garden has been steadily increasing over the last couple of years with more and more people realizing the pleasures of caring for birds.
This has increased the number of questions that we see from the bird owning and bird caring community about how they should be going about caring for birds to make sure that they are able to offer them the absolute best care possible.
A huge range of different questions about caring for birds is often asked each month but we have noticed a spike in the number of people specifically asking about specific food types that are safe to feed birds.
One of the more commonly asked ones that we have noticed being asked time and time again is if birds can eat honey or not.
Feeding birds honey is not as straight forward as some people on social media suggest and this further adds to the confusion and results in even more people reaching out and asking for clarification on giving birds honey.
This is why we have decided to publish our own article going over if you should let birds eat honey or not to try and help as many of our readers as possible who either own birds as pets or feed the wild birds in their area.
Can Birds Eat Honey?
Although honey is a natural food, it generally should not be given to birds due to their digestive systems not having evolved to be able to effectively process honey.
On top of this, honey can also contain bacteria that is harmless to humans but can result in a number of different problems in birds adding additional risks to them.
Some birds can also have problems with honey or other sticky food getting stuck in their beak too and causing even more problems making it best to just avoid giving birds honey altogether as there are suitable bird food products that are cheap and much better for birds that you should use.
So for the most part, we would not recommend that any of our readers try to feed their pet birds or the wild birds in their area honey if possible.
Now, we know that some birds “can” eat honey and that there are videos on social media of people giving their birds honey but just because these birds can eat honey, does not mean that they should eat honey.
This is one of the main problems that we see a amongst the bird owning community, people get their birds to do something that they probably shouldn’t, record it, put it on social media and then before you know it, there’s hundreds of people doing the same thing and it quickly spreads.
Is Honey Dangerous For Birds?
Honey does present some dangers for birds ranging from a potential choking hazard to honey containing bacteria that present a risk to birds.
Most birds can have issues successfully digesting honey too with it often resulting in digestive upset if birds do consume honey that can result in a messy clean up in your home.
That said, there is nothing toxic about honey for birds but we would still advise against you giving your bird honey if possible.
As we mentioned earlier in the article there are plenty of suitable bird food products on the market that you are able to use as the main staple for your birds as well as a huge number of excellent bird treats too.
There are so many suitable alternative foods for your pet bird other than honey that there is simply no need to give your bird honey in any situation.
The majority of bird foods both staple core foods as well as bird treats often working out to be cheaper than honey too so feeding your pet bird a suitable food often works out to be cheaper and more budget friendly than giving your pet bird an unsuitable food such as honey.
Conclusion
That concludes our article going over if birds can eat honey or not to an end. We hope that we have been able to help our readers better understand why they should be trying to avoid giving their bird honey as a food source. It is just too risky and presents too many risks to make it worth it while also working out to be more expensive than regular bird food that offers a much better nutritional profile for birds both domesticated and wild making it a much better option than honey.
