What are your degu's favourite food and treats?

warren said:

I feed Kaytee Forti-diet from Walmart. Has no molasses or sugar. I Make my own ingredients to mix with it; split green peas, broccoli, red bell peppers, carrots, parsley, thyme,romain lettuce,spinach,green beans,spweet potatoes, lentils, and brown rice. Lentels and rice needs to boil about 20 min, then rinsed in cold water. Chop rest of vegs and put everything in defydrator, includind rice and lintels. After completely dried, some only turn kind of leathery, I add rolled oats, beet seeds, caraway seeds, and you can even add grass seeds. I use 11/2 cups to 2 cups per 5lb bag of GP feed and they love it. Don't add any more than that or they will just eat the additives. This will last a long time with the pellets. Good luck.

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Kaytee Forti-Diet does have molasses, actually, unless you're feeding a different variety than all of the ones I've seen. I would avoid Kaytee foods in general, there are a lot of problems with them. Now that good quality degu foods are available there's no need to bother with other pellets, anyway . Try Sun Seed Sunscription Diet for degus. It's one of the best degu pellets on the market.

Feeding vegetables is good but I wouldn't feed so many grains. All of that sugar can lead to obesity and diabetes. They have no need for grains like rice and oats. The diet should consist of mostly grass hays (like timothy), fresh grasses/weeds, leafy green vegetables (limit peppers, carrots, etc.), and herbs. They can also have flowers, a limited amount of other veggies (like the peppers), and a small amount of degu pellets daily. Anything else (grains, seeds, nuts, etc.) is a rare treat only.

Oh, and there's no need to dehydrate everything. A dehydrator is great for making treats and dehydrating veggies that they won't eat fresh. But fresh is always better and degus will usually eat fresh vegetables with a little patience.