Our Red Lord Amazon.

3 days ago my Fiancee and I bought our first bird a Red Lord Amazon. We were looking around and went onto craigslist and found the ad for Lady Bird!. We called the woman who had her and she was selling her because she didnt have enough time for her. We went over and met her and fell in love with her! She was climbing all over us letting us pet her and rubbing her body. As you can imagine we bought her right there. I feel like we stole her only paying $100 for her and all of her toys and cage. Her cage is absolutely huge! It looks like a ferret cage that stands 5.5 feet tall 4 feet wide and 3 feet deep. Will this kind of cage be ok? She spends 90% of the day out of the cage anyway so im guessing it will be fine. She is about 4 years old and we were told that she is a female but no dna test was done so who really knows what sex she is. We think her beak is way to long and will have it trimmed on tuesday when she goes to the vet. She was fed mostly seed her entire life which we will try to transition her to a good pellet but so far she wont touch it. The only fruit we can get her to eat a little of is oranges. We tried noodles and she will eat a couple but tonight we will try beans. My only major question is that she stinks. The lady we got her from said she never gave her a bath so we gave her one last night and she didnt seem to mind it. Today she still doesnt smell the best so we were wondering if they make a bird safe shampoo? We look forward to learning more so we are glad we found this forum. [/IMG] [/IMG]

Very nice, welcome to the forum. You where able to find a good Avian Vet ? I'd spend the extra money and do the blood testing. Birds on that diet have issue with Vit A and their liver. It's great your fixing her diet , you might need to try different pellets/sizes to find one she'll eat. I'd start by feeding as a treat. Anyway, lots of threads about switching over your birds diet.

Make sure who ever works on that beak doesn't try and do it all at once. If they're using a dremel tool , take it easy, it gets hotter than you think. That beak is sensitive. We'll be glad to help and hope to see you around. PS it's alright to go in the exam room with the vet when they treat your bird and don't be afraid to speak up.

Congratulations to you and your fiance! Lady Bird sure is beautiful!! And yes, you got her for one heck of a great price.

The cage sounds plenty big for her. Are there different sized (in diameter and texture) perches for her? Does she have toys? A sandy perch perhaps?

No, please do not use any kind of shampoo on her. All Amazons have a certain scent, but most people find it rather pleasing. I've never encountered a bird that actually stank. At least not to this nose.

If she's never had a bath that could possibly contribute to her odor. Amazons normally LOVE water, so regular spritzing should be quite welcome by her. Take it slow at first, especially if she isn't used to it. But it you see her opening her wing, pretending to be a bat, then that's a good sign that she loves the water. Go ahead and drench her then until she shows you she's had enough. And preferably in the morning, so she has time to dry thoroughly.

Slowly convert her to a more nutritious diet. Try always offering her some fresh fruit and veggies. If she sees you eat it, and making a bit fuss over how yummy it is, she may be more eager to try it. Don't give up - it may take time, but once she realizes there's more to food than seeds, she should be welcoming it. Amazons are great eaters.

Good luck at the vet! It's a great idea to give her a full exam. You should be able to have many MANY happy years with sweet Lady Bird.

Hi and welcome to the forum. There is nothing I can say that hasnt been said already. She is beautiful and I thank you for trying to improve her life. Congrats on your new baby.

Welcome new member! I also have a Red Lored Zon and she is also a picky eater. I try every day by offering her berries,veggies and scrambled egg. She wont touch a thing except her seed. I am also trying to transition mine onto pellets and doing my best to get her used to water and baths. Check some of the threads on transitioning from seed to pellet. There is one thread that offers phone numbers for the different companies. Try calling them to get samples of their food so you might see which she prefers.

Welcome to the wonderful world of amazons I know zons have a musty smell to them but that smells nice IMO but if you say she stinks then I'm glad you have gave her a bath if your thinking about having her DNA sexed don't worry it doesn't cost that much to have done. Her cage sounds really big also and for the price of $100 you can't go wrong and if your getting her beak trimmed after I would buy a bunch of natural wood perches and a pedicure perch that way in future you won't need to take a trip to the avian for nail trimming and beak trimming there a great investment as i have one for my zon aswell as a natural wood perch thanks to henpecked who kindly sent me one over. Also I'm glad your trying to get her onto a healthy pellet diet once she's eating it she will thank you big time I'm sure I wish you all the best with your new amazon.

I would definitely get blood work done at the vet. Its odd for a 4 year old bird to have an overgrowing beak unless there are underlying liver problems. And seed only diets tend to cause liver problems. Most often on a young bird with no other issues, this can be resolved with a diet change.
The cage is probably okay unless its really rusty or has dangerous bar spacing where she can stick her head through or places wher she can get toes stuck. Also check it over for sharp ends of wires as some cheap small mammal cages are like that.

You really need to go out this weekend and get a digital gram scale. You can buy one for about $30-$40 at an Office Depot or similar. Whenever attempting a diet change, you need to watch the birds weight. Do not attempt a diet change unless you have already been weighing the bird for a few days and you have established what normal is for your bird. You also need to find out from your vet if your bird needs to loose any weight. Often birds with overgrown beaks are also a little overweight which leads to fatty liver disease(hepatic lipidosis). Although from the pics your bird doens't look too bad.

When I start a diet change on a new bird, I start by adding new things but not taking away any old things. That is something you can do now. Pick a pellet(my birds like Zupreem Natural pellets in the parrot/conure size). Put a few pellets in her bowl with her seed. A lot of birds that have been on seed only for a long time will convert to pellets faster than veggies because they are dry and some birds don't like the icky slimey feeling of wet food if they aren't used to it. Getting your bird on a mostly pellet diet is probably the quickest way to solve the dietary issues leading to the overgrown beak unless you can get her eating veggies faster.

After a couple weeks, once I'm sure the bird's weight has stabilized and I have a good record of what normal is and I know that the bird is at least at a healthy weight, I will start reducing the seed and increasing the pellets. If the bird is a hard core seed junky, they will often resist this by loosing 10-20 grams over a couple of days, acting unhappy, pacing and generally being pathetic trying to make you break down and give the old food. Amazons usually aren't that bad to convert. Once you get past those 2-3 rough days where they think you are for sure starving them to death, they will start eating their pellets with gusto and not look back unless you start giving them so much seed they feel full enough to be picky again. You do the same thing with veggies. You can offer now, but later on while your converting to pellets, have a bowl of veggies in there too so the bird has a choice of veggies and pellets. Nether is a bad choice. Down the road, it would be good if at least 25-50% of the birds diet is fresh or fresh and cooked at home veggies. IMO pellets and seed only can lead to kidney problems later on. They need the moisture that real food brings. But for short term, pellets might be a quicker fix to the dietary problems causing your bird's beak issues.

Also for reference since a lot of new people are convinced their bird isn't eating hardly anything, my 500 gram yellow naped amazons get about 1-2 tablespoons of pellets. 1 teaspoon of seed. And another 1-2 tablespoons of a combination veggie, fruit and cooked or sprouted bean and grain mix. So about 3-5 tablespoons total of food per day depending on how dense the soft food is. Most likely your red lored is smaller than my birds, so will eat less. In other words, if its cage came with a large bowl and you fill it half full and wonder why it doesn't look like the bird is eating much, probably you gave it way more food than it would normally actually eat. I just mention that because some people become alarmed that the little angel surely can't be eating nearly enough to live when doing a diet conversion.

Also, amazons do have a certain aroma that is natural for them. If they are stressed(scary new home) or sick(bad diet) they will tend more toward a dirty socks smell. If healthy and happy, it tends more toward a nice homey sweet musky smell. Either will take getting used to, but I think once she calms down, gets a few baths and you get her diet straitened out, it won't be so noticeable. It may take a couple months though to get her skin feeling better if she had a vitamin A deficiency which almost all seed only amazons do. You'll probably notice the smell is super strong at the vet and in your car on the way home.

Hello and welcome to the forum, she is lovely. As others have said, a full blood work at the vet would be good just so you can see if she is healthy and what problems she may have. Let us know how the vet check goes, looking forward to hearing how she goes!

I think i love melissa, she gives such good answers.

Welcome, she is beautiful!