This is my first time posting on Pluckers Parlor. Looking to see if anyone has some insight on this situation. Kozmo (white bellied caique) is my 8 year old female, she is bonded with her female buddy Mickey, also 8 years old. Got them at 6 months old...have been (and will be) their only owner. Around 2 years of age, I was able to get them off of their seed mix and onto Harrison's pellets. I noticed that Kozmo started plucking her legs (those beautiful yellow pantaloons!!). I thought that it might be the corn and soy that is in Harrison's, so I changed them to Hari's/Tropican Alternative pellet (no soy, no corn). No improvement...plucking is continuing on her belly and chest. So, I got thinking about what @Mizzely always says about pellets (the best pellet is what they will eat and what they do well on). Well, they did best on seeds...so now I'm offering seeds, pellets [Alternative] (Mickey will still eat these, Kozmo just likes to throw them), sprouted seeds for breakfast, carrots and sweet peppers daily (they love these), kale weekly, berries and walnut and almond daily. Their feather colors are gorgeous!!
A bit more information: 1) Kozmo has always been the more high strung/excitable of the two (caique owners will understand); she is the one who's body language I need to pay close attention to.
2) When all of this started, it seemed to increase after a bath. She would just start preening/plucking. This continues to this day. They bathe in their water dish 1/2 per week.
3) She will pluck a pin feather, make a big "ouch" sound, and eat the feather. Usually 4-5 feathers in succession.
4) Her vet (who has now retired) found her to be a little low on calcium. We are slowly bringing that up (last check was Oct. 2021, she was at 8...normal is 8.3- 11.1 mg/dl)
5) Kozmo's albumin is low (0.7....normal 1.8-2.5 g/dl). Not sure what to do about this? Her body condition is good, don't know her weight (she's afraid of the scale), but her musculature is good....she's a real good flyer.
6) They have a big cage (6'x 3 1/2'x 2 1/2') in our living room (it's just me and my husband). This cage I clean every 5 days. Full spectrum lighting 12 hours out of the day. I work part time, so am home a lot (I prefer the company of my birds over most people!). They are out of their cage about 2 hours out of the day...I also have 2 green cheeks who have a lot more out time (they don't need as much supervision as the caiques).
I've heard that the pin feather plucking and eating is a sign of needing more protein. Not sure how true this is? They get about 2 TBSP. of hemp seed daily and sprouted lentils daily. They get some foraging opportunities daily (not a lot...this is something I need to improve on). I've ordered, from thebestbirdfood.com, their "Dirty Bird" detox to give it a try.
Any insights will be appreciated (or thread suggestions that I should follow).
Thank you for taking the time to read all of this
A bit more information: 1) Kozmo has always been the more high strung/excitable of the two (caique owners will understand); she is the one who's body language I need to pay close attention to.
2) When all of this started, it seemed to increase after a bath. She would just start preening/plucking. This continues to this day. They bathe in their water dish 1/2 per week.
3) She will pluck a pin feather, make a big "ouch" sound, and eat the feather. Usually 4-5 feathers in succession.
4) Her vet (who has now retired) found her to be a little low on calcium. We are slowly bringing that up (last check was Oct. 2021, she was at 8...normal is 8.3- 11.1 mg/dl)
5) Kozmo's albumin is low (0.7....normal 1.8-2.5 g/dl). Not sure what to do about this? Her body condition is good, don't know her weight (she's afraid of the scale), but her musculature is good....she's a real good flyer.
6) They have a big cage (6'x 3 1/2'x 2 1/2') in our living room (it's just me and my husband). This cage I clean every 5 days. Full spectrum lighting 12 hours out of the day. I work part time, so am home a lot (I prefer the company of my birds over most people!). They are out of their cage about 2 hours out of the day...I also have 2 green cheeks who have a lot more out time (they don't need as much supervision as the caiques).
I've heard that the pin feather plucking and eating is a sign of needing more protein. Not sure how true this is? They get about 2 TBSP. of hemp seed daily and sprouted lentils daily. They get some foraging opportunities daily (not a lot...this is something I need to improve on). I've ordered, from thebestbirdfood.com, their "Dirty Bird" detox to give it a try.
Any insights will be appreciated (or thread suggestions that I should follow).
Thank you for taking the time to read all of this