by Pajarita » Wed Oct 09, 2019 9:57 am
Welcome to the forum and thank you so much for taking in poor Nemo!
Now, I seriously doubt he has bumble foot because he has a bad leg. I've had birds with only one leg or one foot and they did not developed bumble foot from always using the same one. It's not the weight that causes bumble foot, it's the perch itself that does it. And it's not the 'smoothness' of the perches that cause it, it's the fact that they all have the same diameter which makes the bird's foot end up with the pressure always on the same spots. Perches need to be of different diameters (from wide to very narrow) and they should never be completely straight and parallel to the floor. Think of tree branches... there are big ones, there are medium ones and there are little ones... they are straight and they are crooked and they are hardly ever perfectly parallel to the ground. The sheer 'uneveness' is what prevents bumble foot because as they go from one branch to another, their feet end up curling in different ways and the pressure points vary from one perch to another. See what I mean?
First thing you need to do is to get yourself branches of different diameters AND a couple of platforms (because opening up the foot to stand on a completely horizontal surface will relieve pressure on the points it uses when it curls around a rouch perch -as in a branch). You can also use one slat (a flat perch) - that will provide even more perching 'variety'.
As to what to use for 'wrapping' material, I use the quilted paper towels. Wrapped a few times around a perch provides a soft and almost 'fluffy' surface for the ulcerated sole and they are easy to change and keep clean. Use either cardboard wrapped in paper towel for the platform (I used to use the old fashioned wooden clothes pins -the ones without the metal thingie) to hold the covering to the platform).
For medicine, I never use ointments on animals - they don't work because they don't last, especially on the sole of a foot! I like sulfa powder. It's an old-fashioned bactericide which dries up an open wound and creates a nice scab to protect it AND the animal can lick it without any danger.
Diet: well, in my personal opinion, grays are the pickiest eaters of all the parrot world BUT persistence, presentation and timing always ends up winning the day. None of my birds likes chop - and I don't blame them. For one thing, it's completely unnatural (birds do not eat 'salads' made out of different ingredients in the wild) and, for another, it's not as nutritious as people think it is because it's made with fresh produce which has already lost a lot of its nutrition by the time it gets to your fridge. I feed gloop with raw produce for breakfast and all day picking and a seed mix, seed/nut or nuts for dinner, depending on the species (my gray eats a tablespoon of a cockatiel seed mix with a two or three different kinds of nuts in it -like 1/4 walnut, 1 almond and 1 pistachio, for example). I also supplement them twice or three times a week with a multivitamin/mineral in their water. The thing is that if you free-feed any type of protein food, you will never get a gray to eat a good diet. You might get an amazon or a quaker to eat some produce this way but never a gray. Try a grain-only gloop and, when you see he is eating it, start adding frozen veggies to it one by one (start with sweet corn, then peas, then carrots, etc) and always eat raw produce with him early in the morning (parrots learn what is good to eat from other parrots but in the absence of another one, it falls to us to provide them with the example).
I hope that what I am going to say does not offend you but the video of Nemo in the park shows a stressed out bird, on high alert for predators. He is NOT a happy camper, my dear. I know that you did it because you thought it was the best thing for him but it's not. Parrots are not adventurous animals... they are born, live and die in the same known and familiar relatively small territory and are always surrounded by their family. Having a single bird in a human home is bad enough for them without taking it out to a completely unfamiliar place, with weird noises and smells and no flock around them to make them feel safe. Stressed out parrots do not heal well so, please, eliminate all sources of stress and that includes trips to the park (pet parrots don't know that a park is the closest there is to their natural habitat - they've never lived in one) . Also, make sure he is following a strict solar schedule and that his daily routine follows what would be a natural circadian cycle in the wild.