This is Paulie

[patti]

Although weighing Paulie in the evening is probably the most convenient time, most of what I have read suggests that you will have a more accurate reading of his weight is it is done in the mornings after he does his big poop and before he receives anything to eat.

I'm not aware of the literature you are talking about re weight, but I conducted a little experiment of my own and came to the same conclusion. I weighed Paulie multiple times throughout the day... like 5-6... for the first week, noting the variations. He would sometimes vary by as much as 10 grams in a day. The weight that was most consistent during that time was the morning one, after the morning poop but before breakfast. So now, my morning routine is the following: poop, weight, breakfast. I do that every day and write his numbers down. It is too soon to tell, but it looks like he might be losing about 1-2 grams per week. Probably just 1.

I am going to the vet again today, and will ask questions about gloop, milk thistle, and any other liver-supporting things i can do. I am really worried about his liver function, because weight loss could put extra strain on an already strained liver. And he sure does have fat under those wings!

The omega supplement is formulated specially for birds, given to me by my vet. But I am interested in this text you are talking about. I need a good book. What's the title?

[Pajarita]

It's this book: https://www.amazon.com/Clinical-Medicin ... n+medicine

Please ask your avian vet exactly what is in the omega supplement. It could very well be perfect. I use flax seeds in my gloop for a good natural supplementation but, if I had to use a supplement, I would use a good quality flax seed oil and never fish oil because, for one thing, I don't like to give my birds anything of animal origin but also because most brands use farmed fish instead of wild-caught (farmed having more toxins than wild but been also cheaper). If I am going to be giving a supplement to one of my animals, I rather buy it myself so I know EXACTLY what they are getting (cheaper brands not been tested or monitored by independent third parties and these been the ones used 'in bulk' by most re-sellers which is, pretty much, what the vet is doing: buying the raw material cheap, bottling it and selling it to you at a profit). It pays to be extra careful because avian vets don't study parrot nutrition at all (there is no such chapter on any avian medicine book I've seen or know of but it is possible that newer texts have it) and I know of, at least, one case where an avian vet had given an omega supplement that had 3, 6 and 9 omegas in it.

Also, if your avian vet hasn't done it already (most likely it was done because it's routine with all obese and/or older birds), please ask him/her to do a bile acids test on Paulie. It's the only way you will know for sure what the situation with his liver is.

[patti]

It has been a long time since I have been able to visit this forum... I just moved to a new house, started a new job, and I am very very busy. I hate that the reason that brings me back here is such a negative one. And I hate that I am always too busy to give quality time to my birds.

Before I get into that, though, I thought I would give you a quick update on Paulie, who is doing very very well. To summarize the earlier parts of this thread, Paulie (20-21yo BCC) has been with me since May. He came to me obese, had open sores on his feet, somewhat apathetic to his surroundings, wings clipped so short it was dangerous, and had plucked about 1/3 of his downie feathers, barbered or overpreened all of his contour feathers from mildly in front to severely in back. He has lost weight, feet are healed. And after MUCH MUCH work I have him foraging for all his meals, despite a big setback when he fell and broke his beak. I kept tracks of his activities and found one day this week he spent 5 hours foraging and only 2.5 hours preening, and all of it "good" preening. He is in good shape for his next vert checkup! I would like to tell you more about Paulie, but that will have to wait for later because Lily is in a crisis.

I caught Lily plucking this morning. No doubt: pulling out her downie feathers and yelping when she does. She pulled out about 9 of them right in front of me!! From her upper back, underneath her wing, and then from her legs. And bit off the end of one of her contour feathers by her foot. With a real pissy attitude.

I am devastated DEVASTATED DEVASTATED!!! ARGHHHh. I hope that someone reads this soon. I feel like a terrible parront.... even though Paulie is doing so well now, I have stressed and neglected my other baby to the point that she is hurting herself. She has always been the happiest bird and has no history of bad behavior (although some signs here and there that it might develop). She's had a tough time recently, but this level of negativity surprised me. I can only hope that I have noticed before this becomes a habit.

The move was stressful for her and she has been "mad" at me for a month now. Lack of interaction with me due to my work schedule...she is the middle of a massive molt but isn't comfortable enough to bathe...and just went through puberty. She is jealous of Paulie. So I have a pretty good idea of what some definite causes are. There are also others that could be causes (artifical light at night, itchy dry skin, mites or other physical problems), and I will start working on all of these known and potential sources. My success with Paulie gives me confidence that I can do a lot by attending to Lily's needs a bit more, especially with the help from all of you here. But it doesn't stop me from feeling absolutely terrible about this, and stressed because my current work schedule is a bit crazy, and worried that this will be a permanent problem. I'm going to watch the video feed from yesterday to see if she was doing it while I was away... I have about 20 hours of video of her.

Here's what happened: I noticed it first thing this morning. It came with lots of biting and anger, and I preferred to have her bite me than pluck herself so i stuck my finger in there to redirect her away. Then, everytime she plucked I gave her a little earthquake to get her to stop. then praised her when she continued preening without plucking. then i gave her a bath... she hasn't bathed for about 6 weeks because she isn't comfortable in the new house yet. I just had to be patient: it took an hour but I was able to get her to do it by just standing there and bringing her back over and over again. Urgh... I haven't had the time be that patient with her and she wouldn't do it on her own but thankfully today with my full attention i got her to do it. Then I gave her some plums. Then i did some step up training with her favorite junk food - safflower seeds. My goal was to give her junk food to change her mood and it seems to have worked. Right now she is chewing on one of my pens, taking breaks to preen normally.

Tomorrow I have to be gone from 8:45-3:45, so I can't watch her like today.

ugh. she just did it again. It is shocking me how this started all of a sudden and with such vigour. She is in a time out now... dark cage for 10 min.

[galeriagila]

Patti,

I have no ideas beyond what you already expressed, but I do want to toss in my sympathy and sorrow and support.

I'm sure those with more to add will be along soon.

Bestbestbest of luck to you and your birds.

[patti]

thanks

[Wolf]

I can't let you off the hook over Lily's plucking crisis, but I will give you credit for figuring out the most likely causes for this problem, Unfortunately this is not an all of a sudden type of thing, it has been building up for some time before the actual plucking started, Lily just finally hit the end of her patience and could no longer hold it all in.
It is because this has been building up for some time that I can't let you off the hook for this. Lily has been trying to tell you that she was unhappy for quite some time and you did not see it and respond before it caused her to reach this level of frustration. Now with knowing this and with the work that you are going to have to put in to bring this under control, I hope that you understand that you will have to continue to pay close attention to both of these birds or either one of them or both of them will start plucking all over again.

Despite my feeling that letting you off the hook would not help you or be fair to Lily, I also have no desire to be discouraging or hurtful or unfair to you either. You have indeed been very busy and it can be very difficult to keep up when you have so much going on, but I am really sure that you can and will find your way through all of this so that you have one happy flock.

I do not know what field your work is in or if it will readily allow you to set up a set of schedules for interacting with your birds, but It is my opinion that especially if you must work out that schedules are one of the best ways to deal with your birds and their needs. I know that trying to schedule two separate 4 hour periods for your birds to be out of their cages and to interact with you is not practical and probably pretty much impossible to do. Your best bet on this is to start working on introductions so that they can both be out of their cages at the same time. You may have to begin with one bird on each side of you so that you can intervene as needed to keep them from fighting. If yours are like mine their favorite place to be is on me when they are out of their cages and it can keep you rather busy keeping them apart to begin with but it is very much worth it in the long run. Also both of your birds will still be much happier if they get shorter but more frequent amounts of time to spend with and on you. This is a very good reason to not clip either of their wings. It is much easier to let them fly to you one at a time and to allow them both the means of escaping from the other one while they are both out of their cages if they can fly.

When Kiki and Kookooloo were first dealing with the fact that they were going to have to share me with the other one, I was constantly putting one or the other one down on their side of me to keep them from attacking either myself or the other one. But now They can both spend time on me although they can't get within reach of the other one even now, but this is because of Kookooloo's attitude, she is my Grey, and nor Kiki's, she is my Senegal.

If you are patient as well as consistent and set up schedules that will allow them to know what to expect and when to expect it then I am sure that you can get through this in good shape with both of your birds.

[galeriagila]

I'm so lucky. I have read that Patagonians are verrrrry plucking-prone... the 'net is full ofexamples.
Through my 20-plus working years, he was so lonely.
I credit the regularity/predictability of our quality-times, I GUESS, no matter how short the times in any certain era...
Still, I'm just flat lucky.
Thanks to all who share here.

[patti]

Thank you.

this is exactly why I am so upset about this. because i already knew she was upset. i have known that the move would be stressful. i spent a lot of time working with them so that they would be strong for it! starting in july I was packing everything up in the old place, and Lily had a big problem with all of the boxes everywhere and all the change. really upset. then i moved into the new place in august, and the move was delayed due to freeway closures which took a huge toll on my physically. Paulie fell and broke his break the day before we moved, which added stress for everyone. then lily has to adjust to this new place while my work started with a long orientation followed by a disaster (not of my making) that meant I had to work several long days in a row my fist week on the job after orientation. i knew that it was taking a toll on her, but it was just a long string of accidents and things that needed to be done. i have boarded her for a week or two without incident.... maybe i should have done that. It would have cost an extra thousand dollars or more but it would have been less stressful for her, given everything that ended up happening. i guess i am upset because i don't see how i could have done better, which makes me think that maybe i just shouldnt have birds. hopefully, i am just thinking that because i am upset becusee i really love them.

but also I read a post a while ago by someone who mentioned that their bird did the same thing - had a coniption one day and pulled out a bunch of feathers, then never did it again. I am hoping that the same will happen with Lily. I scanned through the video of her from yesterday and didn't see her doing it. or day before.

[Wolf]

Changes are always hard on our birds although some of them deal with it somewhat better than others, but it is a huge stress for them. I think that in this case your trying to prepare for it caused your bird to stress even more than normal because it produced changes that she could see before the actual move. Perhaps it would have been better to pack up what you could to make the move easier on you, but then have kept it all out of their sight. I say this because you really can't prepare them for this type of change so it would have been less stressful if she saw no evidence of it until she was actually moved. That in itself is more than enough stress for your birds to deal with. Make a note of it so that you can remember it for future reference and see if it helps as much as I think that it will.

I also understand that sometimes we can't do things much differently than what we did and in addition to that there are always some factors that are outside of our ability to control, so try to not be so hard on yourself over it this time. There is always a first time of doing anything and that is when we will always make the largest number of mistakes and all we can do is to try and learn from them. If you can't hide all of the evidence of something like this move, about the only thing that you can do about it to help your bird to get through it is to include them in the preparations, such as in the packing up of things, just be careful not to pack the bird too. This will not stop them from seeing that something is up but the added time with you may help them a lot in dealing with it. Our birds derive a lot of their sense of security and well being from their interactions with us, just as they do with their flocks in the wild. So the best thing that we can do for them when we see that they are beginning to stress over anything is to find some way to spend more time with them. I know that with something like packing things up for a move that it can be rather frustrating to have one or two birds supervising you and even possibly getting a little bit scared of paper rustleing and rattleing but then they may not get too scared and may even just want to help by playing with and helping you to shred some of the paper or boxes that you don't really need to have shredded.

None of this can help you with the move that you have just made, but may be useful for future moves. They are at least worth a try in the future. Sometime all that you can do is the best that you know how to do at the time and hope to stay out of your own way. Believe me I pretty much live by this last statement. Right now you are also stressing, but it will pass. You can get through all of this and everything will work out fine, just try to give your birds some extra time with you while you are unpacking and putting things away. Being with and on you is the best thing in addition to talking with them that you can do to reassure them so that they can relax more and quicker, you are their security blanket, so to speak.

[galeriagila]

Patti, yes, that was my bird who plucked a patch and then stopped. We were having a big argument about his having to go back in the cage. He was beside himself and reached down and ripped a very full beak of feathers from his breast, leaving a half-of-a-dime size bare patch.

We have moved six times. My strategy was always to keep him right with me, through packing, driving to the new place, and unpacking. Sometimes that was across town; once it was from New Mexico to Cleveland. That was a car ride I'll never forget, let me tell you. He hollered HELLO, STOP IT and GAIL and more, all the way there, punctuated by the usual screams.

I may be fooling myself, but I think he actually enjoyed the whole thing. He loves riding in the car, jumping in and out of boxes, and going to new places.

I'm sure a bird's basic temperament impacts reactions to moving. Maybe also early experiences... we visited other parrots, went to Rennaisance fairs, and stuff like that, back in NM.