I hope you guys can help... I'm panicking and have been in tears more than once today (no sleep and being a trainee teacher and a Mum doesn't help!!)
Aku (African Grey - age unknown) fell off her perch 4 (maybe 5) times last night... once she got trapped (removed the natural perch that she got stuck on immediately) and once she landed on her side on floor of the cage and cried and was disorientated... she snuggled up with me after that time, and she was twitchy (I think perhaps this is what my grandmother meant when she said she was having 'fits' last Jan... I inherited Aku after my grandmother passed away in July...) she was unbalanced after each 'twitch'...
I have removed all the high up perches... but she is now trying to sleep holding onto the edges of the cage... so I am sure she will fall again... I am so worried about her.
We have no idea how old she is, as my Grandmother rescued her, but we can't remember exactly when (around 15 years ago though probably...) and we don't know how old Aku was at that time...
What might this be? Could it be old age?
Since coming to me, she's had a solar lamp, she's been on a mix of cooked food and a little of her familiar sunflower / seed mix, but I'm just transitioning over to pellets supplemented with some 'chop' style food (parrot friendly versions of our dahl / stir fries generally) and palm oil on toast each morning... I've been putting about 5 drips of calcivet onto her toast every few days and also mixing in some fussy feeder supplement with her palm oil... although, now she is on pellets, I guess these are unneccessary... I'm calling the vet tomorrow... but given that I'm at a school in one village and the vet is in another town, and my house is in another town, and there is half an hour between each of these places, I really don't think I can physically get her to the vet before the weekend... :/ I know we need to do bloods... But I am terrified they will advise putting her down (she has plucked herself so badly again she always did pluck... but it's worse again, in spite of everything I'm doing.) I know my grandmother would never have agreed to that... and my grief for my grandmother is so badly mixed up in caring for Aku, it's making this all ten times worse... (& it would have been bad enough anyway as she is just the absolute sweetest African Grey I have ever known... she is so gentle, no matter what...)
Please, any advice?! Any tips? How can I make her cage safer? How do I reduce the risk of her falling? What might be causing this?
Thank you...
Judith.
xxx
Aku (African Grey - age unknown) fell off her perch 4 (maybe 5) times last night... once she got trapped (removed the natural perch that she got stuck on immediately) and once she landed on her side on floor of the cage and cried and was disorientated... she snuggled up with me after that time, and she was twitchy (I think perhaps this is what my grandmother meant when she said she was having 'fits' last Jan... I inherited Aku after my grandmother passed away in July...) she was unbalanced after each 'twitch'...
I have removed all the high up perches... but she is now trying to sleep holding onto the edges of the cage... so I am sure she will fall again... I am so worried about her.
We have no idea how old she is, as my Grandmother rescued her, but we can't remember exactly when (around 15 years ago though probably...) and we don't know how old Aku was at that time...
What might this be? Could it be old age?
Since coming to me, she's had a solar lamp, she's been on a mix of cooked food and a little of her familiar sunflower / seed mix, but I'm just transitioning over to pellets supplemented with some 'chop' style food (parrot friendly versions of our dahl / stir fries generally) and palm oil on toast each morning... I've been putting about 5 drips of calcivet onto her toast every few days and also mixing in some fussy feeder supplement with her palm oil... although, now she is on pellets, I guess these are unneccessary... I'm calling the vet tomorrow... but given that I'm at a school in one village and the vet is in another town, and my house is in another town, and there is half an hour between each of these places, I really don't think I can physically get her to the vet before the weekend... :/ I know we need to do bloods... But I am terrified they will advise putting her down (she has plucked herself so badly again she always did pluck... but it's worse again, in spite of everything I'm doing.) I know my grandmother would never have agreed to that... and my grief for my grandmother is so badly mixed up in caring for Aku, it's making this all ten times worse... (& it would have been bad enough anyway as she is just the absolute sweetest African Grey I have ever known... she is so gentle, no matter what...)
Please, any advice?! Any tips? How can I make her cage safer? How do I reduce the risk of her falling? What might be causing this?
Thank you...
Judith.
xxx