Hi there,

Do you cook your veggies?

I've been using the corn/peas/greenbean frozen mix and thawing it out a bit then chopping the greenbeans up. I did cook some sweet potato and made it into a mashed potato with a bit of maple syrup. They ignored it. My kids will eat the corn and peas but rarely eat the greenbeans. They are on HPW, and sometimes it is gone and other times it is untouched. ?? They get a fruit relish that I froze in ice-cube trays. They don't like that either, but will usually dig out the blueberries and grapes. The rest of the stuff is either on the wall or the floor of the cage.

They really love dry oatmeal. ?? I soaked some raisens in applejuice and they liked that.

My male is eating well, but the female still is really picky. He is gaining weight but she's still really tiny. We can definitely tell them apart now just in size.

I just wondered if everyone was cooking the veggies or giving them raw or just unfrozen. ??

Thanks

I use a frozen mix as well. I thaw them out then serve. My babies will eat the corn and peas and sometimes the green beans. But they almost never eat the carrots. I did give them some cucumber for a treat the other night and they LOVED it. You could try giving yout girl some fresh cucumber!

Be a little care with too much raisins. They are high in iron and you want to watch the iron content.

I feed frozen mixed veggies too. By the time they get to them they are thawed out.

My gliders' favorite frozen mix has been a corn/asparagus/carrot mix. Favorite is a strong word, though, since they are extremely picky veggie eaters.

Corn they will eat raw or cooked. They will sort of pick at cooked sweet potatoes, but only if they are un-mashed.

They will occasionally eat the very tips of cooked asparagus.

They both seem to like the leafy green parts of raw celery - not the stalks.

They will eat a few pieces of cooked carrot. Green beans I haven't tried yet.

Basically, corn is the only veggie I can count on them to eat, which is not great because of the high phosphorus content.

My girls also ADORE uncooked oatmeal, and would eat nothing else if I let them, but you have to be careful that it does not constipate them. Watch for signs of straining or hissing when they defecate. You can always counteract the oatmeal with some apple juice or applesauce.

I do both. If it is hard like sweet potato or carrot I cook them so the are softer. I feed raw and frozen as well and I also use the relish and smoothie modified for better ratios because I am feeding the HPW.

My guys don't really care for sweet potato (tried it the other night) but last night I smeared a tad of sweet potato baby food on their hpw..licked it all up! And peas lol...I too just get the frozen veggie mix. Some suggies like the leafy part of celery.

And my guys seem to like cucumbers too & watermelon. Have you tried that yet? Papaya is real good if you haven't tried that yet either.

I process all my fruit and veggies into smallish pieces then freeze it but I cooked up all the spinach and collards I had before freezing them but I only give my kids some spinach/collards once every couple weeks. (They're high in oxalytes so you have to boil them to decrease it a little bit)

Have you tried processing the stuff they don't like into smaller pieces and putting not as much in the mix? My kids won't touch strawberries but I cut them into tiny pieces and put maybe a couple in the mix then add a little diluted apple juice. My 2 eat it with no problems...

Watch out for the corn on the HPW diet. Corn has a high Phosporous level so it's really not that good to give to them regularly.

I feed my boys a peas and carrot frozen mix, which they seem to like ok. When I do feed corn, which is only occasionally, they gobble that stuff right up, and will leave the carrots and peas virtully untouched. I am going to try green beans once I have run out of the peas and carrots which should be soon. I don't eat s.potatoes so I would never have any of that around for them, but I may have to go ou and buy one to try! I never cook any of their veggies and they seem to like them ok. HTH

Thank you all, so much..! I guess I'm not too far off the mark then.

Yep, I tried Cucumber, they eat the center then throw the rest away. It is funny how they will "fling" stuff out of the cage when they are done. They do like corn, and the sugar-snap peas (fresh). They like to pull the pieces apart to get to the little peas inside.

Papaya went over real well, and I tried an apricot, but I don't know if it was ripe or not, it tasted awfully bitter to me. They tasted it, but went for other stuff. Watermelon is a real winner, so is honeydew and cantalope.

The frozen fruit cubes is a watery mess. They don't seem to like to pick through it. Is the fruit smoothie creamy?

Thanks again