Injury causes temporary seperation between Sennies

[JaydeParrot]

Over a week ago I took my Hide out around a DIY shop wearing his harness, he was on a short lead (I knotted it) and did so well that I decided to take him out the next day as well, I put his harness on took to a pet store (it doesn't sell birds), a supermarket and a short walk in a forest.

When I got back and took the harness off I noticed a red mark where the buckle had been, there was no cut or exact mark it was just a red irritation mark.

Hide for some reason plucked his stomach feathers last year and is still taking time to grow them back.

I wondered whether the buckle rubbed against the bare skin and caused an irrition, Hide did also fiddle with the buckle while the harness was on, that could have added to the irritation?

I gently washed the mark with warm water, dried him and put him back in his cage with his mate Cain.

In the morning I looked at the mark and realised it had scabbed over, I don't think much of the closest avian vet and the other avian vet is too far away. I dabbed a little vinegar on th scab, waited a few minutes and then gently washed it with warm water.

It kept seeming to get better then worse (it looked like he was picking at it), I was seriously considering buying a plastic parrot collar until I realised that Hide was leaving it alone, Cain was picking at it, causing him to scream and bite her everytime she tries to pull the scab off, he gave her a really small nick on the skin just above her beak but even that hasn't detered her.

He's been healing really well as of late however, I heard a scream today, looked at Hide and realised that Cain had pulled at the scab and caused it to very slightly bleed.

I applied a clean tissue to his scab until the blood had completly stopped waited ten minutes and then gave his stomach a quick bathe in lukewarm water.

I figure the water helps his scab dry up and heal faster, but not being around Cain is also a factor in healing. I've had to seperate them for now, which neither of them seems happy with, does anyone know how long it takes for scabs to heal in birds? The scab's about a centimetre heigh and wide.

It was so sweet then, Hide's currently inside the cage and Cain's outside, Hide just posted a big dried banana slice through the bars to Cain and they snapped it in half to have half each, .

[Faraaz]

Hope your sennie gets better! I don't know how much time it takes for it to heal so I would leave it up to some of the bigger guys to answer this question.

[Wolf]

Sorry, I can't answer your question either. Sorry about the injury to your bird.
I am glad that you caught it and then caught what was occurring with his mate. This is a great example though as to why birds hide illness and injury the way that they do. I wouldn't want to be a bird in a flock of birds and sustain a minor injury. Kiki picks at any scab that she can find on me, she is intent on making it go away by the act of removal and then she has a wound on me that she intends to fix, again by its removal. She doesn't understand that you can't fix it that way. She doesn't cars though, she is on a mission to remove that nasty little puncture, and she doesn't care how deep she has to go to find the bottom of it and remove it.

[Faraaz]

Sorry, I can't answer your question either. Sorry about the injury to your bird.
I am glad that you caught it and then caught what was occurring with his mate. This is a great example though as to why birds hide illness and injury the way that they do. I wouldn't want to be a bird in a flock of birds and sustain a minor injury. Kiki picks at any scab that she can find on me, she is intent on making it go away by the act of removal and then she has a wound on me that she intends to fix, again by its removal. She doesn't understand that you can't fix it that way. She doesn't cars though, she is on a mission to remove that nasty little puncture, and she doesn't care how deep she has to go to find the bottom of it and remove it.

Exact thing Truman did to me. I had a small scab on my arm from a accident and Truman was so upset that he got mad at the scar and started to act hostile to it. He was trying to get the scab off me. To me it looked like a scab and to him, It looked like a undefined item which is harming me.

[Pajarita]

How long it'll take depends on where it is and how deep so you'll just have to wait and see. But, next time they get a small boo-boo, don't put vinegar on it, it stings something awful and it's not a good disinfectant anyway. Use peroxide instead. Also, personally, I would not use that harness again.

[JaydeParrot]

It's difficult to say whether it was completely due to the harness, do you think him being bald on his stomach could have contributed to it?

[JaydeParrot]

Thanks for the replies wolf and faraaz, interesting to know you've both had situations where your bird has tried to remove your scab. Many people say being an ill parrot would be hard but apparently being an ill seagull is worse. Was listening to the radio a week ago and heard that seagulls who show illness are attacked and eaten by other seagulls. .

[Wolf]

When you are a Senegal and live in a flock of say 20 to30 other Senegals and you develop a small scrape and they all insist on fixing it I don't think the net effect is any different than if you are a Seagull.

[Pajarita]

LOL- No, I don't think it would be any different, either. But parrots are different than seagulls, they always try to hide when sick or wounded.

As to the 'bald spot' contributing to the wound, yes, most likely it did. Plumage does not only provide insulation, it also protects their skin. But, with some exceptions (like penguins, for example), feathers don't grow all over a bird's body, they grown in 'rows' and only in certain areas called feather tracts or pterylae. Between these feathered areas, there are spaces where there are no feathers (called apterylae). We cannot tell by looking at them because Nature made it so the feathers are all 'pointed' in such a way that they seem to cover their entire body but, if you blow on them or separate them with your fingers, you can see that there are bald spots underneath. The point of this been that a harness can move the contour feathers (these are the 'rounded' ones that cover their body) out of the way and end up rubbing against a 'bald spot' so, either the harness is too small or was put on too tight or is not the right kind for the bird but, whatever the reason is, it already rubbed the skin raw to the point that a scab formed so, personally, I would not use it.