I am very concerned with Stress and how it can bring on illness in a bird.
Yesterday, not long after typing momentary enjoyment with my birds, did Simon my Congo AFrican Grey fly down and break a blood feather. Simon doesn't handle stress very well at all. I've worked so hard with him over the last year to show him humans can be trusted. Simon's never had to undergo any type of invasive proceeders before in his lifetime. This was not going to go over very good and I knew it. Our vet that is 5 minutes away was not open (figures)so we had to travel 30 minutes away to the emerg clinic. The pulling of the blood feather was done, but this event created so much stress for Simon
You see, with PDD exposed birds we have no way of knowing if any of my other birds have contracted this disease. Some birds incubate the disease and can without me, the vet, etc knowing....and can for days, weeks, months, and even years when and *if* the disease activates. Stress is the one factor that can active a PDD infected bird.
I am doing all I can to keep stress non-existant, but how to avoid accidents like this? I can't unless I cage them constantly......which would only cause MORE stress. So I cannot win. There is no full proof way of dealing with issues like this.
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Simon this morning is back to his normal self. Whew.
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Bailey I am concerned with still. Although she has not appeared to worsen, she still is too eager for handfeeding in the morning to my liking. She is fully weaned and USED to only take a taste at the night time feeding..her increased desire for this feeding raises a red flag.
I will be talking with Dr. Taylor tommorrow as well as Dr.Kover to finally discuss our next option with Bailey.
