Q: Depressed bird

Answered by chestnut on 10/4/2005, 4:25 pm

A: You need a VET!!

> my nan has a a young bird that looks very depressed and has
> gone very quiet. i am looking for information on how to
> improve his cage and make him have more to do as at the
> moment all he has is a mirror. I have little money and need
> a cheap way of enriching this sorry little bird as its
> distressing seeing him in this way.
>


A bird depressed and quiet needs more then toys this bird needs a Board Certified Avian Vet!

Anytime you notice a difference in a birds personality/behavior/looks from the normal you should have the bird checked by a Board Certified Avian Vet.

I DO NOT recommend Mirrors for birds, BUT I have to ask you did before the bird becoming quiet and depressed as you say, did the bird used to inact with the mirror at all, with the image the bird saw in the mirror. IF yes to this then your bird needs more then toys here as it needs a vet NOW to ascertain its health.

The reason I DO NOT recommend mirrors is you want these birds to adjust and become PETS, with a MIRROR in the cage you are inviting the bird to think it has a MATE and GET more on the aggressive side and not want to interact with YOU.

What breed of bird is this?

Lots of toys for small birds are very cheap like 3 or 4 dollars.
I know this for fact as one of my birds I have to purchase small toys for only.

Have you checked the cage for any other signs that the bird may be ill?

Below is from my fact sheet on Ill/Sick birds, at the bottom of this is some important drug info you need to read. YOU may wish to print this out so you can take it with you.

Anytime you notice a difference in a birds personality/behavior/looks from the normal you should have the bird checked by a Board Certified Avian Vet.

Keep in mind that birds tend to give VERY VERY subtitle signs when they are ill and if you are not aware of them they can be easily over looked IF they are ill it is more then JUST the droppings you have to pay attention to.

Birds do not get sick over night, birds are food for prey animals so they do not show signs of weakness and being ill till the last minute.

This is a preservation response that assures that a sick animal will not ''act sick'' until it is really sick, and literally dying.Because of this response they do not act sick till they are so sick they are literally dying.

Haveing two birds in the same cage and make it VERY diffcult and hard to tell who's droppings belong to whom, IF this is the case.

Have you checked the birds droppings at all?
Are they loose, runny, watery looking?
Does the bird have any droppings at all?
If any of the above apply then your bird has an infection and needs to see a VET.

Here are just a few signs that you bird is unwell and needs to be attended to by a VET NOW!!

When they start getting fluffed and not eating, lose their balance, look and act sleepy all the time, are not interested in playing, you need a VET involved it does not take long without treatment from this stage for a bird to succumb to whatever the illness this is, with treatment from a VET your bird has a chance of pulling out of the infection. Any and all of the above signs indicate YOUR bird is SICK.

Marked depression, ruffled feathers, lack of appetite, weight loss (unless under a vets orders), not being vocal like normal, problems breathing, a discharge from the eyes and nose are all different signs that indicate illness in a bird.

Any and all of the above signs are indications YOUR bird is SICK.

A full scale work up includes a CBC (complete blood count), a fecal, a gram stain, and a culture, the metal panel I leave in the vet’s court but it might be advisable to do.

If your birds are in with cage mates separate them out. If the cage mate has been exposed to the ill birds it is likely they will come down ill also and need to be seen by the vet also to ascertain their health as well.

Take the cage you have your bird in put a towel around it with a area to get fresh air. Then take a towel wrap it around a heating pad, place the temp on high, place the pad under the cage. Lower all the perches so the bird is near the heat, the fluffing up is trying to give itself heat and keep its self-warm. Make sure the bird has access to food and water; move them down to the birds level if they are usually up high.

The above is not a cure but will help till you get to the vet.

NEVER MED a bird yourself with over the counter drugs they are much weaker then what the VET will give out and do not do the proper job. Not only this what if you are giving the bird the completely wrong meds for this then you could be harming insted of helping.

If you asked some at a pet store for help on this as to what type of meds to use 9 times out of 10 they honestly do not know and they are no more a vet then you are.

PLEASE make sure you go to a BOARD CERTIFIED AVIAN VET as most vets are like a regular MD to us and do not really know birds that well. Kind a think like this if you get an eye check up you go to an eye Dr for this not a MD as they know eyes very very well right. Well the same thing really applies with birds also most vets do not know enough about birds so you need to find one that specializes in them that is BOARD CERTIFIED.

Here are some sites for you to locate a board certified avian vet in your area if you do not already have one you go to.
http://www.abvp.com/finddiplomate.aspx
http://www.aav.org/vet-lookup/
http://www.aav.org/activemembers.html
http://www.birdsnways.com/articles/abvpvets.htm

Always make sure you have a safe way to transport your friend to the vet.
Where to locate bird carriers and sites to give you ideas for this.
http://gallery.bcentral.com/Gallery/ProductListing.aspx?GID=5128020&Dept=463669
http://www.birdandcage.com/carrier.html

When going to the vet PLEASE make sure you take along fresh droppings of no more then 24 hours old to go with you. The vet can use this towards the exam on the fecal the bird may need done. Suggestion change the paper the night before so you have fresh droppings to take in.

DO NOT allow the VET to give your bird BAYTRIL/CIPRO as this can either give your bird bad side effects (like respiratory system problems) or kill your bird ask for OTHER ALTERNATIVES. A vet that offers BAYTRIL/CIPRO to me is not a VET worth going to. DO NOT be afraid to ask what the VET is doing and why!!

Although this drug is a wide spectrum antibiotic it is also one of the that I know that has killed and brought on many bad side effects that birds will live with the rest of their lives after using this drug.

Stay away from meds that go in the water as 9 out of 10 times it will detour them from drinking the water they need cause the taste is awful. Things added to the water can be a bit on the bitter side and a big turn off for the birds to drink.

If it must go in the water you can try to mask it with a bit of Orange Tang this will help your gamble some that the bird will drink a bit more then before but it is a 50/50 chance unless your bird was brought up drinking things other then water.

A bit of info concerning these drugs

The person that I posted this info to and copied it here for you to read also you can find at this link
http://www.practical-pet-care.com/bird_question.php?ID=4.2005010812115023

Her bird was given Baytril went blind was under a year old when all this happen, it had tons of problems after that in and out of the vets office about every two weeks till the intestines just shut down.

I know of another VERY young Keet that ended up with respiratory problems from this. The owner fought with VETS to get him back to being some what normal again but he still has trouble breathing. I was recently inform that even with all his fighting to survive that he just passed away and he was well under a yr of age maybe about 6 months.

Baytril can cause blindness in cats and as my one VET says and I quote ''Any toxic side effects that happen in one species can, under the right circumstances, happen in another.''

Cipro is the same drug as Baytril and also can cause terrible side effects.
Anything with a Quin to the name has some baytril in and can be dangerous to ANY animal. Enrofloxacin is another name for Baytril, Baytril is more of a layman word started by VETs if I am correct.

As far as the respiratory if the bird gets stressed or exicted it will leave them giving like a wheezing sound & panting like they are hot yet it may not be hot out or hot in the home.

From one of my vets
''It could cause upper respiratory problems if the bird inhaled any of the stuff it was throwing up. A most serious side effect is tendons dissolving or coming loose & gut destruction. I have known it to cause birds to throw up most everything it ate for up to a year.''

Baytril is manufactured by the Bayer Animal Health.

On this site is what happen to one persons dog
http://www.vetinfo.com/deffect.html#Baytril

On this site it even causes problems for foals which are a larger body mass then even a cat or dog so you get the picture of what it can do to a bird.
http://www.cas.psu.edu/docs/CASDEPT/VET/vetex/equi/11981.html

On this site read under ''flouroquinilones eg. Baytril and Orbax''
http://aava.org/pub/iatrogenic.html

Two more sites to read on
http://petplace.netscape.com/articles/artShow.asp?artID=1521
http://pubs.acs.org/cen/news/83/i32/8332baytril.html

One person I know said that her bird was on Baytril for two weeks and quote
''The bird had been molting. The feather pre-Baytril was normal, and the feather during Baytril looked like a pine tree with no leaves on the branches. Post Baytril, the feather was again normal.''

Another person I know took her grey to the vet was given a shot of Baytril everything was fine went to the car to go home the bird fell over dead in 20 min, it went into arrest from the shot of Baytril which is another side effect of this drug.

On this site if you scroll down and read
http://www.westonaprice.org/healthissues/cipro.html
It talks about Cipro (same as baytril) not being good for mice these guys are smaller then some birds not all but some and warns of the use with them.
''Mice lacking this cytochrome died shortly after birth and showed symptoms of severe respiratory distress. Respiratory distress is also a side-effect of ciprofloxacin in adults.''

This site below says the same as above
http://www.bruha.com/pfpc/html/cipro.html

From this site
http://www.quakerparrots.com/qtips/sick_bird__antibiotics.htm
''Baytril is quite good for intestinal infections but not so helpful for
respiratory ones.'' Yet it can cause ''gut destruction''.

Read on this site ''OTHER CIPRO SIDE EFFECTS''
http://www.rawfoodinfo.com/articles/art_cipro.html

From this site
http://lioneagle.tripod.com/RestoreDemocracy/Cipro.html
''While the FDA in August 2000 approved CIPRO as the first-line treatment against anthrax, a few months later (October 2000) it asked Bayer to remove BAYTRIL - its equivalent for animals.
The FDA proposed banning the fluoroquinolones, which chicken and turkey farmers have given to birds in their water since 1995 to help shield the animals from infection. The agency acted after linking the drugs to a jump in Campylobacter bacteria immune to the medications. Nearly 18 percent of one common strain that infects humans are now immune to the very same drugs which were considered the last line of defense against the infection.
Campylobacter is the leading bacterial cause of food poisoning in the United States. Typically contracted through raw or undercooked meat, the germs afflict more than 2 million people and kill some 500 each year in the US, according to the CDC.''

If you read in the site below look 3rd or 4th paragraph starting with ''The CBC & panel'' you will se that not just this one VET but lots of VETS do not do the testing needed for our feathered friends that should be done and just prescribe Baytril as a over all drug with out knowing what is REALLY wrong.
http://www.landofvos.com/tales/batmb/beauty.html

There is plenty more you can read on this if you wish just go to Google and type in ''Baytril side effects in birds'' or ''Baytril side effects'' or ''Cipro side effects'' last one would be ''Quinolones side effects'' you will be surprised with what you will find.

We all have to trust our VETS to know what is best for our feathered friends, but just as we should trust them we shoud also educate ourselves so as not to be blind sided and have some knowledge so we can question things.

I hope this info can be helpful to BUT see a Board Certified Avian Vet to ascertain the health of this bird.