Pippa
Meeting neighbors
I have a pet house sparrow (the little brown birds that live in cities and suburbs, hence the name) that I found as a little brand new hatched baby. Giant yolk sac, head tucked way up, whole 9 yards. She's grown up wonderfully and is into her first molt. I was hanging out with her by her cage when she got onto a little perch that is on the outside so she can hop out of the cage. It shifted when she landed so she took off and landed on the, yep you guessed it, rat cage. 4 of my rats are interested in her if she lands on one of the cages (which I highly discourage as I do not want her to lose a toe) but one of the like to charge over and try to eat poor little Pippa. Today I couldn't get over to her fast enough. One of the rats shot over and Pippa being the big little bird she is started attack the rats face and stomach. Rat sticks her paw through the cage and grabs a handful of feathers off of Pippa's head. I grabbed my screaming little baby and calmed her down but now she has a bald spot that takes up half of her head. I dabbed a little palm oil on it (organic, sustainably harvested, human food grade) but she took a bath an hour later though I'm sure most of it stayed on. She is mid molt so she has some pin feathers starting to grow in all ready which is nice but what I'm most concerned about is the fact that rats have very sharp little claws and while there wasn't blood, I would bet there are some little mini and micro cuts in her head.
Is Blu-Kote safe for birds? I've used it on my rats before but birds are also very sensitive. And is there anything I can do to help her feathers grow in she already gets some palm oil about the size of a grain of rice and she HATES the misting bottle so I don't know if aloe vera and water would work although I do have a reptile mister that she might want to go through.
This was really long and scrambled, sorry about that but I'm really worried about my baby. I see her and feel bad although I think by now it doesn't hurt, it is mildly endearing and cute. She also just started to eat Roudybush today (and loves it btw but I bought the 44 oz bag and came home to an 8 oz sample. Grr.) she used to be on Mazuri, I don't know if that matters at all)
And one last thing, Pippa's feet turn in really badly to the point where on a flat surface, shes just hopping on the outside of her feet and they are flat. On a perch one foot is almost normal and the other can sometimes uncurl depending on the shape/size of the perch (all natural sticks from outside, no dowels) and her mood. She gets along absolutely fine and her feet never uncurled as well as a normal baby does around 4-6 days of age (we rescue and release quite a few sparrow nestlings) so she's had it since hatching I guess. I don't really care or notice it now but if there is something we could do, it would be nice to know.
Thank you in advance for any answers. It's hard enough to be essentially writing the book on captive sparrows since there is no info anywhere! Thanks again but sorry for being scatter brained. :/
*Neither of the rats in my avatar are a culprit, they live next to Pippa and don't really mind her. They are the good rats.
Is Blu-Kote safe for birds? I've used it on my rats before but birds are also very sensitive. And is there anything I can do to help her feathers grow in she already gets some palm oil about the size of a grain of rice and she HATES the misting bottle so I don't know if aloe vera and water would work although I do have a reptile mister that she might want to go through.
This was really long and scrambled, sorry about that but I'm really worried about my baby. I see her and feel bad although I think by now it doesn't hurt, it is mildly endearing and cute. She also just started to eat Roudybush today (and loves it btw but I bought the 44 oz bag and came home to an 8 oz sample. Grr.) she used to be on Mazuri, I don't know if that matters at all)
And one last thing, Pippa's feet turn in really badly to the point where on a flat surface, shes just hopping on the outside of her feet and they are flat. On a perch one foot is almost normal and the other can sometimes uncurl depending on the shape/size of the perch (all natural sticks from outside, no dowels) and her mood. She gets along absolutely fine and her feet never uncurled as well as a normal baby does around 4-6 days of age (we rescue and release quite a few sparrow nestlings) so she's had it since hatching I guess. I don't really care or notice it now but if there is something we could do, it would be nice to know.
Thank you in advance for any answers. It's hard enough to be essentially writing the book on captive sparrows since there is no info anywhere! Thanks again but sorry for being scatter brained. :/
*Neither of the rats in my avatar are a culprit, they live next to Pippa and don't really mind her. They are the good rats.
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