can anyone help?

Ive had our beautiful amazon mealy Zazu for 2 years. I noticed last thursday morning that he was puffed up and was using his tummy a lot to breathe. He came straight over for a tickle and was still eating and drinking. The next day he was still the same and very quiet so we took him to our avian vet who said he looked like he may have a respitory infection and said they would keep him in and use nebulisatiin to treat him. They rang me on monday and said he was still eating drinking and passing faeces fine and they had listened to his breathing and there was no issues and no blockages stopping him from breathing. Their only concern was that he was very quiet but i imagined this was down to being in a strange environment as he was a rescue parrot. They offfered me to pick him up on tuesday. I got a phone call in tuesday morning to say they went to check him and he had died overnight. I dont understand what went wrong and i have been blaming myself since. We never knew his exact age but when we bought him they predicted he was about 10 meaning he would only have been 13. We have been in the same house for a year and have not moved his cage at all. We miss him so much and would just love to know whats happened to our poor boy. Anyone have any ideas? I was blaming myself saying i should never have let him stay there as im worried the stress of being there has done it

Did you had a necropsy done to find out the reason why?

No we didnt think we would be able to. And to be honest we were just so heartbroken we werent thinking straight :-(

I'm sure you were heart broken and that's probably the last thing you were thinking about. Don't be too hard on yourself, there can be soooo many things that was going on. And I'm very sorry to hear you losing your baby like that.

Thank you. Ive cried ever since and cant face going in my living room. House is too quiet and i miss his little voice

I know what you mean....When the dog I rescued killed one of my birds I was devastated. And he died in my arms and I cried like no tomorrow....I was so upset that I can't bear to even have his cage around. I threw the cage out the door, I'm never like that as I don't throw stuffs out like that. I just picked it up, open the door and threw it out. My partner disassembled it and got rid of it the next day cause it was too much for me to handle. I cried for weeks. So yea I completely understand what your going through. But I had my other animals to take care of, medicines to distribute at that time and that kept me busy enough to keep my mind off of it, but when I'm not doing anything is when it hits me. It's just gonna take you time to grief....

Its awful how much it breaks your heart. I have a dog whos staring at me right now wondering why im crying. I keep hearing zazus little noises he used to make and i still want to say hello to him when i walk in the front room. I cant get over how i wasnt there during his last few days but i was convinced he was coming home

Im looking at bird adoption again already to fill the emptiness but then wonder if i could put myself through this again

Sorry to hear you lost your zon!


At minimum, an avian vet should do a gram stain to check for infections. If a sinus infection is suspected, then a flush/gram stain of the nostrils/mouth needs to be done.


Amazons are prone to vitamin A deficiency and can get sinus infections because of it. They are also prone to obesity and health related things to obesity.


Sounds like he was really sick and not feeling well and the vet wasn't able to figure out what was wrong.


May he rest in peace now. :60: