Baby Green Wing macaw refusing formula at 11 weeks old

[chad84]

Actually, I am not disagreeing with the vet. I just think that given the symptoms, the age of the baby, the conditions it was 'found' and the fact that no bloodwork was done, it pays to be extra careful and cover all loose ends - thus, the recommendation for the addition of an antifungal.

But, if he is eating more, gaining weight and his symptoms are disappearing, he is getting better (and YAAAYYYY for that!).

The carrot puree is good but, like Wolf said, he needs to be fed a larger variety and offer soft foods to eat on its own in a regular basis.

Maybe you didn't read the previous posts before you jumped unto the 'bandwagon'.




That's from a previous post.
He has those soft food available all day long. I change it every 4 hours. He has formula because he is a baby, he has carrot because of vitamin A deficiency and he has soft food because I caught him trying to eat anything he sees on the ground.

[chad84]

Night guys, fed Robert 90 ml as the 120 ml seems to make him throw up a little.

After I fed him I decided to grab a bite. Took me 45mins to eat as I had to fight off Robert from my plate. He flew up to my lap and I placed him back to the ground then he flew back up to my lap again. This repeated about 12 times. I put him on the table and he jumped back down to my lap. Anywhere I put him he just flew back to my lap. Now that I have finished eating he is just sitting on my stomach licking my top and bottom lips. He is also obsessed with my teeth. Constantly trying to open my mouth. He takes 5 minute breaks to do this erie beak crunching and grinding. Then he goes back to licking my lips and goes back to beak grinding. Why does he grind beak? Beak crunching/grind is loud and it crawls my blood a little.

Can't get him off my stomach. I wanna pee and can't move. Hostage!

[Wolf]

The beak grinding thing is a sign of contentment and he is happy, it is a good thing. Lucky for me my birds are much smaller than your bird so the sound of their beak grinding is not nearly as loud. Other than that I think that he feels secure on your lap and he just want to relax and be near you.

[Pajarita]

Maybe you didn't read the previous posts before you jumped unto the 'bandwagon'.

That's from a previous post.
He has those soft food available all day long. I change it every 4 hours. He has formula because he is a baby, he has carrot because of vitamin A deficiency and he has soft food because I caught him trying to eat anything he sees on the ground.

No, I had seen those. But, and correct me if I am wrong, the soft food you show only has brown rice in it which means VERY low protein and inadequate variety of amino acids. Babies need a lot of protein to grow but not all protein is created equal. The more kinds of amino acids a protein has, the better it is but you also have to take into consideration other things (soy is a complete protein but it has other elements that don't make it as healthy as most people think - and that's why I am not a fan of handfeeding formulas). Quinoa is also complete protein but the grain is very small and it usually does not work well for large species on its own but you can cook it and mix it with other grains. Hemp is great, large grains and complete protein. Oats and kamut are both real good for parrots, too.

[chad84]

Goodnight all. I have so much updates for you! This is gonna be long...
Robert is weighing 900g. That's a considerable drop from the 950g 1 week ago. He is currently 14 weeks 3 days. He is on day 7 of the clavamox/enhancin antibiotic cocktail. I reduced his feeding from 120c 3 times a day to 90cc 3 times a day. Most days since he started antibiotic he throws up. Not a whole lot, about 5ml to 10ml. But it still worries me.

He also hasn't been eating much for the last 3 days (Day 5, 6 & 7 of antibiotics).
During these days he ate 40 ml in the morning, almost nothing lunchtime and almost nothing in the night. He doesn't have the feeding response and just simply does not want to swallow the formula. I offer him chop and soft food 3 times a day but he just plays with it, breaking it up to smaller pieces but I can't tell if he is eating any at all. Since he isn't really interested in formula I was hoping he would at least eat his chop and soft food. I need my Robby Boy to eat ANYTHING. But he isn't eating.

Robert started flying a few days ago. All he wants to do is fly to me from where ever he is in the house. He flies 5 - 6 times a day. If someone is holding him or if he is perched and I pass, he jumps down and follows me, if I hide he comes flying around and trying to land on me. He still flaps a ton. But he flies and circles in the living room looking for a place to land (me). He loves us so much. Can never leave him home. He is a love HOG. He gets loving by me till I am tired then goes to my wife.

So the weight loss could be that he isn't eating AND he is flying quite a bit.

He still pants a bit when he flies but I haven't really noticed him panting at rest.
One thing I must note. Robert isn't acting sick in any way. He picks fights with me, follows me around and cuddles with me almost all day making his baby sounds and begging to be played with. He is ALWAYS climbing, flapping, flying and BITING everything in sight.

Now that I have stopped him from trying to get into my mouth, his new obsession is my NOSE. He licks and nibbles my nose everywhere ALL DAY LONG.

Tomorrow I am going to the vet for a 1 week follow up check up and to do an x ray to check out his throat, lungs, air sacs and anything else. What else should the x ray tell me? The vet says they don't really do avian blood tests and avian cultures. So on Monday I am going to our government veterinary lab to ask if they will do the blood tests and cultures. They asked me what they should be testing for. Can you guys tell me?

[Wolf]

I can't really tell you what the right blood tests to request are as I am not all that experienced with this part of parrot keeping. Pajarita would have a much better idea of what to ask for than I do, hopefully she will be able to respond in time for you to do the blood test that are most beneficial for your bird.

[Pajarita]

The most beneficial thing about XRays is the fact that you can see if the liver is enlarged and if everything is where it should be. As to blood work, I would ask for a CBC (this is the Complete Blood Cell Count and it tells you if there is an infection, anemia, etc), an avian biochemistry panel (this one measures enzymes, blood calcium, glucose, etc and it basically tells you if the internal organs are working well) and, if the vet sees that the liver is enlarged or he continues with the yellow urine, a bile acids test (this one measures liver function). Why don't you contact the person in charge of the birds at the zoo and ask him/her where they send their blood samples to be tested?

Personally, I would not be happy about his not eating on a regular basis...

[chad84]

Night guys. As I sit here Robert is preening my beard. And so diligently. I also stopped him from licking my nose just as my mouth as it may be dangerous. He goes through every hair on my mustache and beard. EVERY hair! It tickles so much. if I laugh he just starts over. I am taking 40 mins to write a 2 minute update.

His weight this morning was 920g. He actually ate today! He had 100 ml in the morning, 90 ml at lunch, 95 ml around 6pm and his crop is empty again. I had to force him to eat the formula though. No feeding response. just pouring it at back of throat and asking him nicely to swallow and he does. I have to do this 20 times to get 100 ml in. lol. 5 ml at a time. I love Super Robert (remember he is flying now) so much. These days on the antibiotics he vomits almost on every feeding, only about 2 ml. When I see him gagging I reach for him, hug and kiss him and let him know it will be alright.

Breaking news... I held him at the beak joint tonight and got some head pumps. But they didn't last long enough for me to feed him with head pumping. I got really excited though. Must be the extra vit A. I hope it comes back for good.

Robert is still doing his lick-tickle-preen on me.

He is sleeping throughout the night now and not waking and calling me. Seems he is feeling a little better.


He found a spot on top of the gate that he flies to a few times for the day.

[chad84]

The most beneficial thing about XRays is the fact that you can see if the liver is enlarged and if everything is where it should be. As to blood work, I would ask for a CBC (this is the Complete Blood Cell Count and it tells you if there is an infection, anemia, etc), an avian biochemistry panel (this one measures enzymes, blood calcium, glucose, etc and it basically tells you if the internal organs are working well) and, if the vet sees that the liver is enlarged or he continues with the yellow urine, a bile acids test (this one measures liver function). Why don't you contact the person in charge of the birds at the zoo and ask him/her where they send their blood samples to be tested?

Personally, I would not be happy about his not eating on a regular basis...

Thank you!

[Wolf]

The thing that has me the most concerned right now is his continued not eating. Just before he started flying, I took note of it but was not overly concerned as the going off of his feed to lose some weight at that time is actually normal for a parrot, but once they have been flying for two or three days, they should be back to eating like a champ, so this continuation of an otherwise normal behavior has me concerned.

How often are you currently giving him his handfeeding formula? Have you started looking into a variety of natural foods that are high in beta carotene that you can give him other than just carrots? Beak rubbing is how parrot parents teach their young to have a feeding reflex, so I would definitely continue to do this with him just before feeding times, just my thought on this as it may help. I have to take meds on a daily basis now that my body has started breaking down from years of abuse ( I treated it as if it were indestructible) and sometimes these meds upset my stomach and even if I am hungry, I just can't eat. If he has an infection anywhere in his digestive tract it would make him not want to eat or at least to not eat as much ( no one likes to feel badly). I think that if you have not already started looking into it that I would begin researching probiotics for your bird, I am not sure that they would help while he is on antibiotics but just like beta carotene rich foods they will be of value to your bird on a regular basis for years to come. I would probably talk to my vet about giving this bird a small amount of unpasteurized apple cider vinegar, it helps a birds digestion and helps to prevent infections like yeast infections and probably several others as well and as far as I am aware of has no know side effects, other than improved health and digestion.

These are some of my thoughts concerning your bird and I don't know if any of them will prove useful to you and Robert, but I thought that I would share them with you just in case they could be beneficial.