Yoshi has beak rubbing, sneezing, scratching etc.

Hi everyone,

My 9 month old eckie Yoshi has been a bit off of late and we are struggling to find a cause.
Basically a week before Christmas I had surgery and had to stay over at my parents (with him in a decent cage over there). Ended up there a week post op. He seemed fine, odd sneezing and scratching but he had been sort of moulting.
When we brought him back home it was like a light switch. He became more aggressive, rubbing his beak a lot on everything, scratching his face and neck a lot and sneezing. Plus he stopped moulting it seems. His appetite, droppings, drinking and activity levels haven't really change though.
Took him to an avian vet who had a look, checked his droppings etc. took a small blood sample for 'birdy chlamydia' (that's not the technical term but it's how I remember it). He's had 2 lots of antibiotics now to cover a respiratory/sinus infection, anti-inflammatories daily but still nothing has changed. (I'm also concerned that it might be something simple my vet has over looked or if I should actually change AV).
His diet is fresh fruit/veg every morning (removed in the evening), small mix of seed in with pellets (currently in transition from Pretty Bird Eclectus to Vetafarm Paradise Pellets).
I'm not sure if it's just the rapid changing weather (I'm in Melbourne), allergies, food, stress or something more sinister.
He's become more friendly again but he still sneezes a lot, scratches and rubs excessively. He scratches even when dozing off sometimes.
I also shower him regularly (every second day) and mist him too. Could it be something missing from his diet? I've read about sprouting, edible flowers, fruit/veg, nuts, pellets etc. and it gets pretty confusing and overwhelming!

Any help or suggestions are really welcome!!

I do believe our Amazon had seasonal allergies. He would sneeze and scratch his nose at the same time of year as us. There are other types of infections, what exactly did the vet say the blood test showed?

I have friends with dogs who had skin reactions to some kind of grain in their diet, they had to change dog food and it stopped, and a friend with a dog that got yeast infections in his ear a lot. I hope it's just an allergy, and not a respiratory infection. Keep us posted, will you?

I've heard of that too, Kentuckienne.
Are there any remedies for such? Air purifiers, I suppose? Misting? Humidifers?

What's the humidity level? Jasper will start sneezing/scratching/dry skin if the humidity is too low. I would guess you wouldn't have that issue in Australia but you never know

I know if dust or something gets in their nose it can cause those symptoms as well.

Hi, I live in Victoria, and my eclectus, Oscar, who is around two and a half years old, shares the characteristics you describe in Yoshi. He's been to two different vets, and they say he's in good health.
Oscar scratches a lot. I partly put it down to molting. He's been molting and scratching incessantly since the start of spring. He has new wing feathers growing and he violently scratches his wings, aggressively lunging at his feathers. He also has a stubborn grey patch around his neck and is constantly scratching his neck with his beak and the sides of his head with his feet. My family also has parrots, and I see their parrots scratching the sides of their heads too. I would suggest it's quite common. Some members might suggest giving Yoshi a mist spray to relieve the itching. I shower Oscar each day. I don't know whether it decreases the amount of scratching, but he does seem to really enjoy a shower.
When Oscar was younger, he sneezed a lot. They were only dry sneezes. It was suggested to me that it could be caused by dry air, an irritant in the air, feather dand or the fine hair-like feathers around his nostrils. But birds sneeze. Before Oscar, I had a cockatoo. She sneezed a bit too, but it never bothered me because there was no discharge.
Does Yoshi rub his beak after he's eaten? Oscar rubs his beak after he's eaten, and because he's a guts, he rubs his beak quite a bit. In fact, the more he rubs his beak after a feed the more content he seems to be. Importantly, though, it's quite normal for birds to rub their beaks.
If Yoshi seems a bit off, it could be that he's molting. Molting takes it toll on birds. The first year I had Oscar, I noticed he seemed a bit quieter in the summer, having several rest periods during the day, but it was not long before he was back to being himself.

Wrangler sneezes primarily when he's in the car---not sure why, could be the AC, but I turn it off if I can. He also sneezes post shower--but that's to clear his airway of course. Good luck, let us know what you find out.

great thread it has answered a bunch of my questions, so I guess Maxx is pretty normal.

thanks all

Thank you everyone for your replies. Humidity is fairly low in Melbourne, so with our 'summer season' having been so varied that might have caused him some distress with possible allergies, dust etc.
He definitely rubs his beak after eating but he also does it all the time. Blood test came back showing no antibodies so its negative ! I managed to have him fairly calm today so I got a good look through his feathers. There's a few of those prickly spines growing around his face and beak so I'm hoping his mood and scratching are primarily in reaction to those. It's hard to see them because his feathers covered them quite well, but once I had him chilled out I found them! And when I was rubbing them (and he wasn't trying to bite my fingers), he stopped scratching and seemed really relaxed.
Keatz - did the grey patches on oscar stay after he molted or what happened?

Hi, Alikat. Glad to hear Yoshi got a good result from the vet.
Oscar still has the grey patch. When he started molting, it was much larger, extending to his chest and up the sides of his head. He also had bald patches on top of his head. They've mostly filled in now but there's a couple of patches on his neck where it hasn't completely filled in. He's still growing new feathers; hopefully, it will eventually fill in, but it seems to be a very long process.
Oscar's got some very large pin feathers under his wings, and it seems to be his primary source of itching at the moment.
I still wouldn't be too concerned about the beak rubbing. I've kept parrots since I was a kid, and from what I've observed, it seems to be a behavior thing rather than a sinister health problem. I've seen parrots rub their beaks just for the sheer pleasure of it. They seem to get a lot of enjoyment out of it.

I am in NSW and my two are moulting. I have gone to daily showers (basically on Gizmo's insistence, he tends to let me know when more regular showers are required by flying to the bathroom and comming back as if to say "come on it's shower time"). Gizmo is especially getting a lot of new feathers, which I really can't see unless he has been soaking in the shower for a bit.

AliKat, I would go to daily showers for now (unless you get another cold snap), Yoshi will appreciate it if he is moulting. If he generally only has a short shower, I would recommend trying to get him to stay under the shower a bit longer until he gets that soaked look to him around the neck, I have to encourage Pebbles to stay in longer, but it really makes a difference to how itchy they get. I find a quick dunk doesn't seem to really help.