Hi there, new bird mum here! My partner and I adopted two ecelectus. We aren’t sure of their age or of their history unfortunately and we are having a few issues and I was hoping to seek some advice. We have been to an avian vet and an avian behaviouralist but I’m still not clear on what we should do.
First off, our girl Lucy, has started plucking. We are trying to find the cause of this and so we did a full blood panel. The vet said there were a few mild changes and she is showing signs of dehydration. She has access to fresh water, changed daily. We are really struggling to fix the plucking. It’s currently winter in Australia and quite cold here in Melbourne. She is now an inside bird but was previously outside in the aviary. We haven’t noticed any feathers on the bottom of the cage but her blue feathers haven’t grown back yet. She has her underfluff covering her chest and back so she isn’t bald.
Secondly, our boy Manu has high amylase. The levels were 832. I have been researching and from what I understand- diet is the main way to address this issue. We feed them a diet shared with us by the avian behaviouralist which consists of legumes, grains, beans, fresh veg (various beans, chickpeas, oat groats, quinoa, hemp, oats, millet, desiccated coconut, fresh veg ect). He loves his food and when training we use chopped almonds, chopped sunflower kernels and sprayed millet. We don’t have previous bloods to compare these new results to but I’m not sure how else to address his high amylase.
Lastly, unfortunately Lucy and Manu just don’t get along. They get very jealous of each other- when one is being handled and the other is not, when one is being trained and the other is not, when we are talking to one and not the other. It’s not as if we completely ignore the other, it’s just impossible to train both at the same time as they get aggressive and attack each other. We try to share the love evenly between the two. My gut is telling me that Lucy may be stressed because of her relationship with Manu and that may be causing her plucking. We really don’t want to rehome one but we also don’t want them living in stress because of each other.
I’m sorry for the long post- I’m just really hoping to seek some good advice.
Thanks,
Belinda.
First off, our girl Lucy, has started plucking. We are trying to find the cause of this and so we did a full blood panel. The vet said there were a few mild changes and she is showing signs of dehydration. She has access to fresh water, changed daily. We are really struggling to fix the plucking. It’s currently winter in Australia and quite cold here in Melbourne. She is now an inside bird but was previously outside in the aviary. We haven’t noticed any feathers on the bottom of the cage but her blue feathers haven’t grown back yet. She has her underfluff covering her chest and back so she isn’t bald.
Secondly, our boy Manu has high amylase. The levels were 832. I have been researching and from what I understand- diet is the main way to address this issue. We feed them a diet shared with us by the avian behaviouralist which consists of legumes, grains, beans, fresh veg (various beans, chickpeas, oat groats, quinoa, hemp, oats, millet, desiccated coconut, fresh veg ect). He loves his food and when training we use chopped almonds, chopped sunflower kernels and sprayed millet. We don’t have previous bloods to compare these new results to but I’m not sure how else to address his high amylase.
Lastly, unfortunately Lucy and Manu just don’t get along. They get very jealous of each other- when one is being handled and the other is not, when one is being trained and the other is not, when we are talking to one and not the other. It’s not as if we completely ignore the other, it’s just impossible to train both at the same time as they get aggressive and attack each other. We try to share the love evenly between the two. My gut is telling me that Lucy may be stressed because of her relationship with Manu and that may be causing her plucking. We really don’t want to rehome one but we also don’t want them living in stress because of each other.
I’m sorry for the long post- I’m just really hoping to seek some good advice.
Thanks,
Belinda.
