My sennie is sick :(

[friend2parrots]

sorry to hear that little Alfie's still unwell. I hope he gets better really soon.

He looks adorable in that photo getting scritches, and closing one eye like that. My birds do that too - its cool, isn't it? Sometimes when I'm scritching Ringo, he will look almost asleep in one eye, but the other eye will be watching the immediate environment VERY ATTENTIVELY for signs of anybody that might get in the way of his scritches. (sometimes he gets a little upset if my husband or Toby come by too close while he's getting scritches )

[janetafloat]

That's funny, and a very handy ability to have! I can think of all sorts of uses for that

[janetafloat]

Second round of antibiotics, and it's torture trying to get the medicine into him, I hate it. So much trickery to get hold of him because he knows what's coming & he's having none of it, then once I've got him his little face looks up at me, beak clamped tight shut, and he s trembling slightly and I feel like an awful bird abuser. Then once I've managed to prise his beak open, all the while reassuring & cajoling him in a soft voice, and ....yes!...squirt the wretched stuff into his little gaping mouth , he invariably manages with a final supreme effort to wriggle free enough to shake his head, and ends up wearing most of it

[marie83]

Second round of antibiotics, and it's torture trying to get the medicine into him, I hate it. So much trickery to get hold of him because he knows what's coming & he's having none of it, then once I've got him his little face looks up at me, beak clamped tight shut, and he s trembling slightly and I feel like an awful bird abuser. Then once I've managed to prise his beak open, all the while reassuring & cajoling him in a soft voice, and ....yes!...squirt the wretched stuff into his little gaping mouth , he invariably manages with a final supreme effort to wriggle free enough to shake his head, and ends up wearing most of it

I feel your pain, Harlie is much the same, its horrible. if you find a solution to that one let me know.
With Ollie it isn't so bad, I have a sunflower ready and give it to him as soon as I've got the meds in his mouth so he is focused on cracking and eating that, although there is always a bit that drips out.

[Andromeda]

I have an idea regarding medicating that may help. It may not work for you but I will share it in case it does.

When my Poi had strep pneumoniae it was impossible to medicate him via a syringe because he was terrified of the syringe; he would scream and run from it because syringes were used by the vet to give him sinus flushes and he recognized them.

What I did was toast a piece of bread and cut off a very small piece---it needs to be large enough to absorb all the medication but other than that it should be as small as possible. After you put the medication on the very center of the small piece of toast and it has been absorbed, put a thin layer of nut butter (I used almond butter but you could use peanut butter) on top of the bread.

My Poi would eat the almond-buttered bread in seconds, he didn't notice or care that there was also medicine in the bread.

[janetafloat]

Thanks for the suggestion, Andromeda, I tried it this afternoon He didn't eat all of it but he's super wary of the meds at this point & says 'whaaaat, it's that rubbish again!'. Tbh I think I'm more traumatised by the whole process than he is, I need to man up.

[Andromeda]

Sorry it didn't work for your bird but it was worth a go! I know how difficult it is to medicate a bird so best wishes and hopefully your Poi will get better soon and it will all be in the past.

[marie83]

Andromeda thats a great idea about the toast, defo one to try with Ollie as I vaguely remember trying to inject the baytril he was on at the very very start into a grape rofl!!
I know it would never work for Harlie though.

Janetafloat might it help if you give him a decoy piece to start with or spread the meds over two pieces to dilute the taste a bit more, I know its not particuarly healthy for him but its not for long.

[janetafloat]

Yeah, I just tried that this morning, marie83...with two tiny bits of warm bread this time, with a tiny bit of apple juice too...he prefers his food warm and mushy. Same as the toast, I reckon he ate about half of it. I still ended up towelling him to make 100% sure he got the other half. Like I said, once I let him go he hops on to the coffee table, resettles his feathers indignantly and takes the treat from me without a problem. I think I'm getting a bit more confident with this every day. Thanks for all the suggestions though, you guys, and good luck with Harlie, I just really hope it sorts the problem for you this time.

[janetafloat]

I just really hope this works for Alfie too....his poop is still pretty runny and this morning it's bubbly.