Any Cockatiel Experts Out There?

[jedimaster91]

I've been noticing something odd with my cockatiel, Oscar. I've had him about 5 or 6 years, and he's always had feather issues. His feathers have always come in rather scraggly looking after a molt, but fluff out once I give Oscar a bath and he stops pouting about it long enough to preen and dry himself off.

Occasionally he gets a wing feather coming in twisted. Literally the shaft will start to spiral. I noticed this particular phenomenon is starting to occur with increasing frequency instead of every so often. His molt before last one of the twisty feathers started coming in, but stopped growing fairly early and I was able to pull it out easily. The last molt he had another one, but this one didn't come out quietly. There was quite a bit of blood (broken blood feathers bleed a LOT) and birdy cursing, but no real harm done. This molt, he has one on each wing coming in twisty. One has already stopped growing and fallen out, but the other has not. And after what happened the last time I tried to pull one out, I'm going to leave it alone.

I've also noticed him chewing at a spot at the crook of his wing. He's not plucking and it doesn't look like mites. I've washed that area several times to see if maybe there was something on his feathers or his skin, but he still keeps chewing at it.

My question is this: is this a serious enough issue for me to take him to the vet? The reasons I hesitate is one, birdy vet is expensive and I don't want to spend a lot of money we don't have on a minor issue, and two, Oscar is not people friendly. You've heard of dogs/cats who love and adore their one person but will tear the throat out of anyone else? I have the aviary equivalent. He only tolerates Mr Jedi on a really good day. I don't want to have to subject the poor birdy vet to my vicious attack beast unless I have to. Generally, Oscar seems to be in good health with no personality or behavioral changes that might indicate a problem. He just has screwy feathers.

Any advice from the wide world of CS?

[Saydrah]

Nutrition deficiency is my first guess. What's he eat?

Yes, he should see the vet for this. Pull a blood panel. Funky feather growth can just be poor nutrition or lack of enough sunlight/full spectrum light, but it can also be an early symptom of something serious. Just go ahead and take him in, believe me, any bird vet worth their diploma has been chomped by bigger birds than a 'tiel. Heck, I'm not even a vet and I've had an Umbrella Cockatoo take a chunk out of me!

[jedimaster91]

He eats a pellet diet. *goes to check the bag* Harrison's Adult Lifetime Fine. I can't really get him to eat much people food (fruits and veggies) even though my other birds adored anything we'd let them eat. Although from your post, I wonder if it's the light as the funky feathers have gotten worse since he moved into a different room that doesn't get as much sunlight.

[calulu]

You don't supplement his pellet food with fresh fruits/veggies and assorted over foods? Sounds to me like it might well be nutritional deficiency.

I used to have an old cockatiel that only wanted to eat sunflower seeds and pelleted food and it took awhile to convince him to try other foods. I finally got him to try fruits and veggies by (and this sounds dumb but it worked for me) eating what I wanted him to eat in front of him and making 'yum yummy' noises before putting some of it in his cage. He did finally start eating other things and getting a more balanced diet.

But I would take your guy to the vet and at least get bloodwork done. If it is a nutritional thing that will narrow it down.

Now, if I could just keep my sun conure off the dinner table and out of everyone's plate life would be simpler.

[jedimaster91]

You don't supplement his pellet food with fresh fruits/veggies and assorted over foods? Sounds to me like it might well be nutritional deficiency.

Believe me, I've tried. I've left goodies in his food bowl, a treat bowl, tried getting him to eat what I was eating...he's taken a few nibbles here and there, but generally doesn't really seem interested. Although, he LOVES Honey Nut Shredded Wheat, but I don't let him have it very often.

I'll call the vet tomorrow to see how much the little darling is going to cost me. Probably a lot.

[It shouldn't]

I have pigeons and rescue them, too, so I've run accross all kinds of feather issues.

Few things come to mind..
Feather issues are mostly nutritional, since he won't eat fresh fruit/veggies, how about adding some vitamin/mineral supplements to his drinking water (available in pet stores in little bottles)

Is he getting enough grit/oyster shell/calcium? Needed big time for feather production.

Have you examined the feather shaft (of the one you pulled out) with a magnifying glass? Some types of mites can't be seen with the naked eye.

Is the humidity high in his room? I don't know about Cockatiels, but pigeons can get a fungal infection on their skin and it will mess with the feathers. The cure for that is to let them bathe in water with apple cider vinegar added. (Do Cockatiels take baths in water?)

[jedimaster91]

He gets a bath in the sink under running water. I dunno about the calcium. He has a cuttlebone but doesn't seem to use it much. Anywho, he's got an appointment on Saturday, so we shall see what the vet says. Hopefully I can just go pick up a bottle of supplements for his water at PetSmart and that will take care of the problem.

[jedimaster91]

Vet's office called today to tell me the exotic vet is in the hospital and can I reschedule. I really want to get Oscar in ASAP, so they gave me the number for another exotic vet way out in BFE. I called them and asked how soon I could get in. They were very accomodating and told me I could drop him off tonight since I work 9-5 tomorrow (they close @ 6). So that's where he is now. I could hear him screeching for me as I walked out the door.

[jedimaster91]

Updates:

Teh Saga of Teh Birdy continues......

FINALLY got the all of the test results back on Oscar. He is NEGATIVE for PBFD (). Turns out he's picked up a little fungal infection (don't ask me how; I dunno) and that's what's making his feathers go screwy. Even better news is the type of fungus is not an aggressive type like aspergillus (sp?) and easily treatable with medication. Super! It also turns out that this particular medication (and I've forgotten the name of it) is also used in people so my local Walgreen's should be able to get it. Awesome!

Now for the bad news. The medication comes in people-sized bottles. Obviously, I don't need a people-sized bottle to treat a cockatiel that weighs about 3 ounces (around 100 grams for our international members ). Really, that's not a huge deal, accept most pharmacies don't like to sell such a small amount (the whole bottle costs around $200-$300 and since it's not for me, insurance probably isn't going to cover it). I was told by the vet that Kroger pharmacies would usually split a bottle. I say super--and since no one at my local Walgreen's ever answers the phone--let's call it in to Kroger. Vet's office called back, said the medication would be in tomorrow (so today) and quoted me a price of $28. All is well.

........Or not. Kroger calls back and says their distributor won't let them split the bottle. AAAAAAAARRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH! The tech was very helpful and asked if there was somewhere else he could transfer the perscription to. I told him the vet's office had already closed and I'd call them in the morning and try to figure it out. So I've got that to do over lunch.

Now, it is VERY possible that I misheard the vet as my brain doesn't seem to want to handle extraneous information not related to my upcoming board exams. And it's really not handling that info too well. There also could be a difference between the Kroger in <my town> and the Kroger in <other town where the vet is>. So I'll ask Vet where she usually gets this medicine and I'll just drive out to <other town> to pick it up.

[AccountingDrone]

Believe me, I've tried. I've left goodies in his food bowl, a treat bowl, tried getting him to eat what I was eating...he's taken a few nibbles here and there, but generally doesn't really seem interested. Although, he LOVES Honey Nut Shredded Wheat, but I don't let him have it very often.

I'll call the vet tomorrow to see how much the little darling is going to cost me. Probably a lot.

This will sound odd, but if he likes you to hold and preen his feathers, then take slivers of fruit and veggies, and after preening his head for a little bit [my dear departed teil Baby loved me preening the feathers on his head] take a sliver of nibble, put it between your lips and 'feed' it to him. Adult teils feed baby teils from their beaks, and sometimes it is enough to trigger them into eating something. When Baby was sick once and not eating well, it would get him to eat when he would normally not eat.