She's gone.

[Pajarita]

Yes, when you contact them, they will send you the little vials in the mail. Now, if I were you, I would not only check for Pacheco because, sometimes, the description of the symptoms you read on the internet are not accurate - for example, going by the internet, Pacheco is supposed to be the only disease that kills so quick that birds die in good weight and still eating but I have discovered this is not true, psittacosis does it, too.

[LadySaphine]

Okay, tomorrow my mom scheduled an appointment with a vet (apparently none of the nearby avian vets want to draw blood- dunno why) for PJ to check if he has anything. And we might send in some blood, if we can.

PJ's been really territorial lately... I think it's because one of his toys had a mirror. I caught him looking at himself and chattering his head off. I removed it. He has been really good natured but he tried to 'bite' (read: nibble) me and chattered me off. I wasn't aware you couldn't give budgies mirror- Peanut loved her mirror toy and Steve doesn't like plastic toys. PJ is a little different than I expected!

[Cedardave]

My sympathies.Im sorry to hear you lost Peanut...I know exactly what your going thru.

[Pajarita]

He is chatting up a storm to the mirror because he is trying to woo that pretty bird in the little window. He sounds hormonal and lonely.

[LadySaphine]

We took PJ to the vet, and she said he was healthy. She didn't feel comfortable drawing blood from him (after all, he is TINY! She said she normally draw blood from larger birds, such as greys/zons/macaws, which come in more often than budgies).

Okay, we did speak to a breeder about getting another bird and pretty much told him our story. He's a pyyhurra breeder and breeds GCC's, maroon-bellies, pearlys, fiery-shouldered, grey-breasted (currently breeding them for wild populations), white-eared, painted, roseifrons, rose-crowned, and a whole ton of other birds. He is a couple of hours from us. Their website is here: http://www.somethingcheeky.com/index.html He seems to be very knowledgeable (at least, he's aware breeding is not a good way to make money) and he did give us some tips.

He said he draws his own bird's blood and sends it to (presumably) the same place you linked me. He tests for gender, chlamydia, and the top three avian diseases. He also doesn't let anybody inside the house/aviaries, which was pretty reasonable. He said he does it for $100 a bird, which did seem reasonable.

He's also the one who urged us to take PJ to the vet, because they carry Polyomavirus (he said he'd stopped breeding budgies because of that). Do you think if we get PJ vaccinated, it would work if he was a carrier?

He also offered to vaccinate our (possibly) new bird. If we do get another bird, I think I'm going to be a lot more cautious. An air purifier is on my christmas list and tomorrow is a cleaning day.

As for PJ's behavior, he really enjoyed the vet visit (well, not being handled, but he did pretty good, considering the fact his feathers were all ruffled!). He really liked looking outside and looking out the window. PJ is a sweet bird, and we have him out often, but the problem with him is that he doesn't care for humans. Sure, he's tame and all that, but he just doesn't want to be with us. He flies off to Steve's cage or Peanut's (well, when it was there). He just doesn't want human interaction. I've thought about getting him another budgie, but I'm worried that THEY won't get along, and then we end up getting two lonely birds. Steve and PJ call out to each other and talk, but Steve is so scared of other birds and he runs away. So I am a bit conflicted.

[Pajarita]

I've had a flock of over 30 budgies at one time and I've never seen a budgie not get along with another one. I am not saying it might not happen, only that, if it does, it must be super rare. And, if you get a female, it simply will not.

As to that breeder, personally, I would not trust somebody who does his own vaccinations and blood drawing. It's illegal in some states (like NJ) where it's considered animal abuse because it's like people who practice medicine without been a doctor (you need to go into the jugular to draw blood from a bird). I would also not bring another bird without making sure there is no disease lurking in your house. Besides, you need to make sure your parents are on board for the expense of taking a sick bird to a 24/7 emergency service at an avian clinic because it's pretty expensive but, sometimes (as in Peanut's case), it's the only thing between life and death.

Vaccines don't work on carriers.