<Articles> - Feather Damaging Behavior & Feather-picking Psittacines

[Karen]

I found both these articles to be an interesting read...

Dr. Susan Clubb wrote an article that was published in the December 2009 edition of the Petage magazine titled “Feather Damaging Behaviors: Grasping for Answers”

Feather Damaging Behavior
Susan L. Clubb, DVM
OVERVIEW OF ISSUE
Feather Damaging Behavior may be associated with a variety of clinical syndromes, however the most common causes are believed to be inflammatory skin disease, or psychological feather damaging behaviors.

The use of paired skin and feather biopsies is a useful diagnostic procedure for psittacine birds exhibiting feather damaging behavior. In this procedure a full thickness skin biopsy is obtained in an area where a bird is plucking feathers, preferable including a growing feather. A second skin biopsy is taken in an area of normal skin at a site where the bird is not plucking, again preferably containing a growing feather. By comparing these 2 sites the pathologist can make the determination as to whether there is an underlying inflammatory disease that may be causing the feather damaging behavior.
Read her full article; http://wvc.omnibooksonline.com/data/papers/2009_V705.pdf

While researching information on Macaw - Inflammatory Skin Disease I found this study article; Feather-picking Psittacines: Histopathology and Species Trends ? Veterinary Pathology

 

[Cynthia & Percy]

very interesting thanks for shaing

 

[waterfaller1]

Thanks, always good to read more on this subject.

 

[Holiday]

Very interesting indeed. There are several things that struck me particularly:

1) She seems to attribute skin inflammation partly to "environmental allergens" and suggests that when plucking birds are moved to a new home and stop plucking, it's because they are removed from the irritants. But, they may be sensitized to new irritants in the new home later on. The first thing that struck me is we really must have good air purifiers. (Macaws especially seem to suffer from seasonal allergies: pollen and mold allergies that might be helped with a quality air purifier).

2 ) The other factor here is diet, of course. The notion of the "exclusion diet" was interesting. Taking it down to bare pellets for a while and gradually adding things to see what the causes might be, or what diet might be suitable. The assumption here seems to be that a quality pelleted diet would not be a causal factor, but I wonder if some birds might not be allergic to, say, corn? What would you do then?
I also really appreciated the list of non-allergenic foods:


Cooked or canned salmon

Cooked chicken​

Spinach or kale

Green peppers​

Green beans​

Cooked eggs


Almonds


Shelled Brazil nuts (raw unsalted)


Spirulina—(If Marine algae)


Olive oil

Strawberries​

Soybeans (roasted)​

Cottage cheese


Sunflower seeds (shelled-limited quantity)

Black beans​

Lentils


Chickpeas


Pinto beans


Garlic


Tofu

Cantaloupe​

3) The study revealed that there was a difference in levels of inflammatory skin disease between birds that had known genders and those whose genders were unknown. Do birds with known genders tend to be those who receive better overall diet and health care from owners? (Not casting aspersions on any of our members here, just pondering a point from the study generally). I suspect that they might be. It does suggest that quality care, diet, air quality, bathing, and vet care can help. Not all pluckers are neglected, but this suggests that care could be improved in those pluckers whose skin is irritated and inflamed by allergies or irritants.

4) And finally, there's bathing. She suggests that bathing a plucking bird should be done twice weekly.​

 

[Karen]

Very interesting indeed.

Glad you got a chance to read the articles. I knew you would like them.

The first thing that struck me is we really must have good air purifiers. (Macaws especially seem to suffer from seasonal allergies: pollen and mold allergies that might be helped with a quality air purifier).

I think air purifiers are mandatory and I also believe that at least one air exchange per week be done (winter and summer) in the home. IMO air exchanging is an over looked husbandry practice.

2 ) The assumption here seems to be that a quality pelleted diet would not be a causal factor, but I wonder if some birds might not be allergic to, say, corn? What would you do then?
I also really appreciated the list of non-allergenic foods:

She says it a good place to start. I think if you've taken the diet down to a bare minimum and are still suspecting a food allergen as a cause you could then take it down another notch if needed and go to one of lowest allergen foods such as the Roudybush Rice or the Harrison's Adult Mash.

I've worked with a low allergen diet and devised a recipe for making Harrison Mash Muffins a while back and my two get a mash muffin every morning and love them.

Loved the low allergen food list too!

I learned so much from reading these articles. I wanted to highlight a few paragraphs that I especially liked and learned from but I would have ended up copying Dr. Clubbs entire article. The study article was good too! I love reading stuff like this.

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