Molting question

[Navre]

Her breeding behavior seems to be lessening.

On April 27, I took her to Angell Animal hospital in Boston. She saw an avian vet, Dr. Simone-Freilicher. She drew blood and ran tests, did a mouth swab, too. The first of the blood work came back that day and there was some elevation of WBC. She was started on .03ml of Enrofloxacin BID. (The bird weighs 67 grams.)
She listened to breath sounds for a long time. She thought she might have heard something in one of the air sacs, but she wasn't sure.

I don't know if this possible infection would have anything to do with the molting issue, but it's good to catch this now. I know that stress an raise a bird's WBC, and due to traffic the ride into the vet was over 90 minutes, so maybe that's all it was. I'm waiting for the rest of the test results.

At a follow-up visit on May 5, breath sounds were clear, so no x-ray was done. The bird has started to molt now, molted feathers look normal, and are molting normally, not being pulled out by the daily struggle to administer the antibiotic. She is remaining on the antibiotic at least until her next follow up on May 12. The plan then is to draw blood again.

As my son and I have both been sick with a bronchitis-like illness for several months, the vet suggested that we be tested for Psittacosis. Although the bird tested negative for psittacosis last summer, she explained that the test is very unreliable in birds and gives many false negatives. She explained that the bird can be asymptomatic but still carry psittacosis.

The vet advised me not to feed warm food during breeding season. She cautioned against anything that might simulate regurgitated food. This echoed the advice I had received from an avian vet on Justanswers.com. Both vets wanted her on a 12/12 light schedule. I talked to the vet about the solar schedule but at any rate, even if I were to go to 12/12, I would have to do it slowly, over time, and not just change things for her abruptly right now.

The vet also advised to change her cage around one a moth, or so, as this would lessen mating behavior, and to make sure she is bathing daily, as the rainy season and the mating season are usually different seasons. Also, for an hour or so after a bath, she will be focused on preening and not on mating.

The vet echoed all the advice I have received here about touching the bird only on the head, and preventing the bird from backing in to me with her tail up. She said, "if the dog were humping your leg, you'd make him stop."

We talked about the possibility of a companion bird, she thought that this would be better to introduce a new bird after the puberty period is over.

She liked the gloop recipe, but advised that I served it no warmer than room temperature. She also told me, as I have been told here, not to leave food out and accessible constantly, as an ecess of food gets the birds thinking about reproduction.

She also suggested trick training as a way to occupy the bird's mind with other things. (Kind of like we send adolescent boys to Boy Scouts. Work on these knots and leave the girls alone!!!)

[Pajarita]

Well, the 12L/12D light schedule is outdated because we now know it doesn't work to stop breeding behaviors (tropical and semitropical birds -which GCCs are- breed on it in the wild). In my personal opinion, I think that vets still recommend this schedule so as to prevent people from keeping them at a 100% human light schedule. As to parrots not producing sexual hormones during the rainy season... well, this is not quite right, either. In climates where there is only a wet and dry season, birds usually start producing sexual hormones precisely during the rainy season in order to be 'ready' to raise young when the dry season arrives (off the top of my head, cockatiels and psittaculas come to mind, two species that would start producing sexual hormones in earnest with daily showers). But GCCs breed in February to April or May (some all the way to the end of July, depending on the actual region they inhabit -they are in NE Argentina, the Brazilian southern edge of the Matto Grosso and in some parts of Bolivia but they are disappearing there) and these months are not rainy in the regions where they come from so it is possible that this advice might work for this particular species. Mine bathes almost every day (she loves, loves, loves her baths, either under the faucet or in a bowl and she is not picky at all about the size, material or location of the bowl, either ) and she doesn't get hormonal from them so I don't know...

Yes, white blood cells do go up under stress but the elevation is usually minimal (can't produce too many 'extra' white cells in less than 2 hours in a car) so if the vet found them to be high, I am sure she already figured this into the equation and believes that there is, most likely, something going on, thus the antibiotic. Did the vet get the results by type of white blood cell? Because some are more from inflammation, some more from infection, some more from chronic disease, etc so pinpointing the type that is elevated helps with the diagnosis.

[Navre]

I believe the advice about the rainy season was specific to GCC.

We Discussed the solar schedule but she said she felt that it did not provide the bird enough sleep.

Intake her back tomorrow for more blood work. She never did say anything about any cultures coming back. Hopefully the blood work will be normal tomorrow. They have their own lab there, so stuff comes back quickly.

Years ago, at about the 6 month check-up, my CAG showed some Gram negative bacteria in a fecal swab. It cultured back as something particularly nasty. They told me that she would need to be inpatient there as the antibiotics necessary were pretty nasty. When I brought the bird back to be admitted, they did another test and said that it showed no gram negative bacteria. They never did have any explanation for where the gram negative bacteria came from, where it went, or how it could have gone away so quickly if she did indeed have the infection. Happy ending, so I didn't think about it much, until this bird tested positive but was asymptomatic a few days later.
Hopefully I'll know more tomorrow or Wednesday.

[Pajarita]

If I may ask, how many birds, what species and for how long has this avian vet had? Or is she one of those avian vets that have no birds? And is this the same vet that goofed so badly on the fecal before?

[Navre]

If I may ask, how many birds, what species and for how long has this avian vet had? Or is she one of those avian vets that have no birds? And is this the same vet that goofed so badly on the fecal before?

The goof on the fecal was in 1990 at a different animal hospital.

I don't know what personal birds this vet has.

She is the first vet featured on this page.
http://www.mspca.org/vet-services/angel ... -team.html

Physical exam of the bird today was unremarkable. Her breath sounds were clear. Blood was taken again and I should have some results back tonight or tomorrow.

[Pajarita]

Hmmm, apparently, she doesn't have any animals of her own (the others all list the pets they have, two of them having birds). Now, don't let what I am going to say influence you in any way because you really cannot go by me as I am a maniac when it comes to my animals but I don't use any vet that doesn't live with animals of his/her own or any avian vet who has no personal experience caring and living with a parrot. In my personal opinion, a vet who has no animals is not an animal lover and, as far as I am concerned, that is a sine-qua-non requirement if they want to treat my animals.

[Navre]

Discussed it with her on the phone today. She has had many birds in the past, and birds are her first love, but due to a family member with severe health issues, she has none right now.

She really does seem to love the animals. She was great with my tortoise, and yesterday she had Silly Bird laying on her back in the palm of her hand. She has never done that for anyone else. She really does seem to have a knack with the bird, even though the bird's 3 previous meetings with her have been exams in which blood was taken. I expected the bird to freak out when she saw the vet walk in. She actually seemed to calm down.

WBC is improving, but still too high to stop the meds. I'm probably not getting enough into her, but we continue for another week. Radiographs are next if there are no improvements.

[Navre]

I suppose I could switch to Dr Noonan, but I don't think I would want to trade a well regarded, experienced vet for a kid who I would card before I let him into an R rated movie!

[Pajarita]

Like I said, don't let my opinion on this influence you. If you like her and are satisfied with her, keep her. But, just an FYI, birds always behave well at the vet precisely because they are afraid.

Why do you say that you might not be getting enough antibiotic into her? Are you having trouble medicating her?

[Navre]

Yes, she hates the medicine, and the dose is so small, .03 ml, that even a bit on her beak and she might not be getting any.