pink spot on bottom of her foot

[Sweet Louise]

As I put Louise to bed, she was clinging to the side of the cage. Her feet are stained from tonight's blackberries but there was a spot on the bottom of her foot that was pink. Not a normal color on her feet and not part of the berry stains. I toweled her (first time I have done that) and cleaned up her feet as best I could and tried to examine the spot. It is a pink, round spot on the bottom of her foot-contained to one total pad on the bottom. I could not get a picture. She does have her regular vet appt this weekend. I have questions if anyone has answers/suggestions..
1. She has a natural perch and a sand covered perch. I do not have a spare perch. The sandy perch seems not do anything as advertised in terms of helping to keep her nails short. I cleaned and f-10'ed the perch and will vet wrap it in the morning. Does this seem reasonable? I kinda think that perch is too rough on her feet and perhaps the cause?
2. Are there other causes? She is not having trouble climbing, walking. It is a little pink and a tiny bit swollen.
3. How does one clean a birds feet? She hates water, It is a challenge to get her in a shower so she gets sprayed. Playing with the water does nothing be evoke a weird look from her, no interest in playing around in water.
4. Louise doesn't like to be handled. She will step up and loves to sit on a shoulder. She seems to like beak rubs. No scritches, no touching her head, wings, feet--she gets snappy. I was pretty surprised I got out of toweling her and cleaning up her feet without a bite--lots of warning snaps....and she punished the towel after she was released.
5. Should I worry about the wire bars that go around her feeding stations?
Any help is appreciated. Thank you.

 

[DQTimnehs]

I imagine it is from the sandy perch. Quack's feet were almost raw when I got her as she had a macaw sized sandy perch by her food bowl. I moved it down to her toy bucket and added natural perches and rope perches and vet wrapped any dowel perches.

 

[Birdbabe]

Sand perches will rub raw spots on they're feet. Get rid of it. Rub some vitamin E oil, aloe vera, or A& D cream on those feeties..I've " vet wrapped " a perch for my birds, one with foot sores , it helped a lot. Her feet look great now..

 

[janicedyh]

I had heard that the sandy perches did that to their feet so this is what I got. The top of the perch is smooth and the grit is actually where their nails rest. Most of my birds perches are crepe myrtle of different sizes.

 

[HolliDaze]

I had heard that the sandy perches did that to their feet so this is what I got. The top of the perch is smooth and the grit is actually where their nails rest. Most of my birds perches are crepe myrtle of different sizes.

I need that.


It's very likely the Sandy perch. I'm no expert on vet wrapping, but if it was the only other perch, I'd get wrap it and try and buy a new one (without the sand) asap. I heard someone say On the forum that birds prefer Sandy perches and often sleep on them

 

[Sweet Louise]

Will order a new perch today. I took it out last night and vet wrapped it this am. Will pick up one of the creams mentioned tonight also. It was worse this am so I made her take a bath and sprayed down her feet. Not all the berry stains came off. Trying to walk that line of doing what must be done without destroying her trust in me. At the bottom right you can see that her skin has cracked open. So glad to have a vet appt this weekend, he only comes every 6 months so if it had to happen glad it did now. Her brother has a sandy perch so his mom will be getting rid of it also.
Thank you for the help and suggestions I’m hoping this got caught quick enough so I won’t have to give oral meds...


ugh, look at that cage. Rust spots. Her new one comes today!

 

[Sweet Louise]

I had heard that the sandy perches did that to their feet so this is what I got. The top of the perch is smooth and the grit is actually where their nails rest. Most of my birds perches are crepe myrtle of different sizes

. Had to look up crape myrtle. Beautiful tree!

 

[aooratrix]

I use the safety pumice perches, too, with no problems.

 

[Lady Jane]

That perch in the photo is not good. Several birds have picked at the perch and ingested the sand or whatever it is. Pink area on bottom of foot is most likely the start of a pressure sore. Just manually trim nails and please don't use those kind of perches. They don't work anyway. My vet advises against using them.

 

[janicedyh]

Lady Jane, I don't know if you are talking about the one I posted, if so it is not "sand" it is merely textured on the sides the nail rests. The perch is non toxic, made from natural pumice stone unlike the sand ones. I initially got the sand ones but threw them out. I had even showed my vet to get his approval. I checked for threads about them on Avian Ave and found only positive comments. Right now I am looking online for info about it being poisonous for our birdies. Lady Jane, do you know of any articles online so I can see if I need to removed them. I have had them for over a year with no issues and Doby was using them for years before he came to me.

 

[Lady Jane]

Was the perch effective? I had that one also as a recommendation of AA person. My budgie picked at it and the color came off. I am happy you found one that your vet liked.

 

[janicedyh]

I found it effective for Nelson and Doby but Kiwi's nails stay laser sharp no matter what. The color will not come off on these. I scrub them with and brush, vinegar, poop off and aviclean, nada. On the other hand, I have a water melon flavored pollen perch that Kiwi likes to sit on in her doorway that the color does come off. On the way to thevet check the other day in bright light I panicked because the bottoms of her feet looked pink. The doc looked at them and low and behold it was the pollen perch. The vet said it would not hurt her.