EAZA Hornbill Management and Husbandry Guidelines

Table 4. Food types and food item suggestions for captive diets
Food types Items
Water rich fruits Apples, pears, tomatoes, oranges, currants, cherries, grapes, pineapple, apricots,
kiwi fruits, strawberries, plums, papayas
Lipid rich fruits Soaked sultanas, avocado, juniper-berries, dates, rosehips, mountain-ash berries
Or: sesame seed oil, palm oil, olive oil
Carbohydrate rich Bananas, passion-fruits
fruits and selenium
Germinated seeds/grain Maize, lentil, beans
Vitamin and mineral
supplements
The iron-, and heavy metals content should remain as low as possible. Calcium
supplement: for example cuttle fish bone, high-calcium limestone, bone meal, egg
shells
Animal food Minced low fat beef, lean poultry, crushed boiled egg, mealworms, crickets and
other insects, one-day-old mice, one-day-old chicks
Produced food Whole grain bread
5.3.2 Manufactured diets
Manufactured diets, particularly in the form of pellets, are becoming increasingly popular
in formulation of diets for captive birds. Particular attention is being given to the need for
low-iron diets. Often a combination of fruits, vegetables and other items are mixed with
the manufactured diet.
Seibels and Vince (2001) listed several larger pellets available from zoo diet
manufacturers considered suitable for toucans (and presumably similarly suitable for
hornbills): Red Apple Jungle Pellets (Marion Zoological), Exact Low Iron Pellets
(Kaytee), Softbill Fare (Reliable Protein), Bird of Paradise Pellets (Zeigler Brothers) Bird
of Paradise Pellets (Zeigler Brothers), Low Iron Maintenance Diet (Harrison), and a
smaller pellet: Tropical Bits (Marion Zoological). Some caution needs to be applied
when calculating total diet nutritional composition using the manufacturer’s data, as it
has been found that nutritional levels of manufactured diets are sometimes not the same
as stated on the label. In constituents such as iron in which only small amounts should be
used, this can be critical.
5.3.3 Gelatin "cake"
Some hornbills will not eat all items in their diet: for example the vitamin and mineral
supplements could remain in the food tray. Hornbills often also waste much food by
throwing it out of the tray. To avoid these problems some diet constituents (vitamin and
mineral supplements, chopped food etc.) can be offered as ingredients in a gelatin "cake"
(Bataille, 1996). Small blocks of this cake can be offered as a part of the standard diet.
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