Lovebird plucking around her vent area

My almost 2 year old female lovebird has an issue. She spends a lot time every day "picking" or "digging" in her vent area. She hangs off the bars of her cage or a toy or the curtain if she is out and reaches between her legs with her head to reach area and "dig" for lack of a better word. She also will regurgitate (and I'm sure it is regurgitation rather than vomiting) and try to put seeds on her vent. She leaves little balls of regurgitated food in her water dish and on the floor of her cage. She got stressed about a year ago when we went on vacation and developed a plucking problem and had plucked her chest bare as well as areas around her neck. Those have since grown back. Her main plucking now is around her vent area. She never draws blood, but seems itchy to me. I took her to the avian vet in May and she was tested for break and feather disease (negative) and psittacosis (also negative). A gram stain came a little negative so she was treated with Diflucan for a yeast infection. That seemed to calm the plucking, but not the vent picking problem. She eats a good diet of pellets and seeds and is otherwise a good eater, active, and happy. Has anyone ever experienced vent picking in their bird? The avian vet didn't seem to be too concerned about it when I told him about it. But I think it is kind of excessive. Any ideas?

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Sounds hormonal...I think some birds do this when preparing to nest. I am saying this under the assumption that everything checked out medically..
Did you get a CBC (blood)?


In terms of hormones:

Do you pet her places other than her head?

How is her light/dark cycle? (How much sun does she get?)

How much uninterrupted sleep does she get nightly?
Do you have a set routine for bedtime etc?

Do you feed warm +mushy foods?

Do you have any other birds in her cage with her or nearby?

Are there any boxes or huts in her cage?

Do you allow her to crawl under blankets or go into dark spaces?
Does she have access to nesting materials (straw,crumbled papers, boxes, etc)?

Has she ever laid an egg?

Thanks for the reply! Here are the answers to your questions.

Do you pet her places other than her head?

No. When she was younger, she would constantly do the "aeroplane" pose where she would spread her wings and squat as if waiting for a mate to mount, but she grew out of that. We don't pet her except when she occasionally allows a cheek or chin scratch.

How is her light/dark cycle? (How much sun does she get?)

We live in sunny South Florida, so she gets sun all day (not direct sun though. Her cage is by a window but the rays don't shine in). She gets covered at night as soon as it is dusk, and uncovered in the morning a bit after the sun rises. I suppose the cycle changes a little throughout the year since we get less daylight during the winter, but we do consistently cover her when it gets dark and uncover her when the sun comes up.

How much uninterrupted sleep does she get nightly?

About 12 hours.

Do you have a set routine for bedtime etc?

She gets feed about 3 hours before bedtime. She gets covered as soon as it starts getting dark. At this time of year around 6pm.

Do you feed warm +mushy foods?

No. She eats pellets and a seed mix. She won't touch vegetables or fruit. Sometimes when she's out when we're eating she eats a bit of bread or chicken or a grain or two of rice.

Do you have any other birds in her cage with her or nearby?

We have a green cheek conure pair and 5 budgies that share the room with her. But they have their own cages. She is alone in her cage. We do let her out and she flies with the budgies, who tolerate her. She adores the conures and regurgitates food for them whenever she gets the chance (which is not often because we discourage them being that close to each other. The conures would bite her if given the chance.

Are there any boxes or huts in her cage?

She has a hollowed coconut that my husband made her when she was a chick that she sleeps in only at night. She doesn't use it during the day.

Do you allow her to crawl under blankets or go into dark spaces?

She doesn't have access to blankets, but she does get very hen like when she flies to the couch and makes clucking noises and bites. She doesn't go there often though.

Does she have access to nesting materials (straw,crumbled papers, boxes, etc)?

We give her the empty paper towel rolls to play with, but remove them once it gets any holes in it. She hasn't attempted to use it as nesting material.

Has she ever laid an egg?

No. No eggs.



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These are the tests she had done at the vet. I'm not sure if the HCT & Differential is the blood test. They did take blood from her little toe.

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Someone did have a similar issue not long ago. Let me see if I can find the thread for you.


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Here it is.

https://r.tapatalk.com/shareLink?sh...orums.com/showthread.php?t=75173&share_type=t


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Colibri22 said:

These are the tests she had done at the vet. I'm not sure if the HCT & Differential is the blood test. They did take blood from her little toe.

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Click to expand...

I think HCT is hematocrit and it is blood-related, but I am wondering if they only looked at that and not other aspects of the blood..?

I would remove any access to dark/cozy places and make sure she isn't getting too much sunlight (guessing she isn't but it can happen). If you can remove the coconut for now (without causing her to lose it) I would (just my opinion). This is still under the assumption that everything turns out okay medically. The clucking around on the couch and regurgitating for conures definitely sounds like hormones. Does she have enough things in her cage to chew on etc? It might help if you could keep her busier during this time.

I doubt they ran just a Crit (ratio of Red Blood Cells to liquid blood volume) and not an entire blood-panel ("Differential" may mean this, but I'm not sure), but it doesn't matter if the results are from May...

Often when they pick around their vent constantly/chronically it's due to either a Gastrointestinal infection, either bacterial or fungal, OR as one of our other members found out this past year, a Kidney/Urinary Tract infection...That was the other member's bird's only symptom, itching her vent and plucking around it every now and then...So if your bird is doing it often, you need to get him to a Certified Avian Vet and have a Fecal culture done, as well as an X-Ray...And you may have to force the issue on the x-ray with the vet, but the only reason that the other member's CAV caught the horrible Kidney Infection their bird had was because they did an x-ray and found that the infection was so advanced (because the only symptom was picking at her vent and nothing else) that the bird's kidney was so enlarged and swollen that it had been putting pressure on her spine and caused some degeneration...If the Vet only does a Fecal or even routine blood-work and not an x-ray too, they may find bacteria and/or fungi in the Fecal (common) and may see elevated White Blood Cells, indicating an infection, so they would naturally assume that the bird has a GI Infection and that's why they are plucking/itching around their vent, and they would never know that the bird has a Kidney Infection, so that's why the X-Ray is so important with this symptom, as a kidney infection in a bird is very easy to miss, as the blood-work will probably show normal kidney-function unless the kidney infection is extremely progressed...

Thanks everyone for the input. I made an appointment for her at the avian vet on Friday this week. I'm praying that it isn't something so serious like a kidney infection. Poor thing!

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We made it back from the CAV tonight. Boo Boo got a hormone shot (and has to go back in 3 weeks to recheck her blood. He said she had elevated immature white blood cells, which apparently may have something to do with her reproductive hormones being off. Her gram stain came back a bit negative again, so she is going to get the Diflucan antifungal again, this time orally instead of in her water. He also gave me an antibiotic called Clavamox because he said she had elevated levels of radicals (I really don't know what that means). Poor bird is going to hate my guts for dosing her twice a day for 14 days with a syringe. [emoji3525] I hope this solves things. I did mention the X-ray and the possibility of a kidney infection, but since some of the other things were a bit off, he wanted to try this approach first.

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Boo Boo at the vet

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Great job at getting her to the vet! Great advice from other members! She has some type of infection that's what elevated immature WBC means, she is cranking them out to fight an infection. So she needs those antibiotic, the diflucan is for yeast. EllenD add Noodles put me on to probiotics and now I'm a bug believer in them. Since you are giving her antibiotics I recommend you start them as well, I got the powder at Petco I sprinkle on food or add to what ever moidt wet food I am feeding like scrambled eggs or oatmeal. I also feed live culture yogurt a couple times a week, read the lable not all yogurt is live culture. I hope she gets better soon. I read the thread you got really great advice and I commend you for following it, and for coming here to ask questions in the first place.

Not sure about the "hate me", just give it a chance.

I had to dose Japies for 6 or 7 weeks straight 2x a day and he did not hate me - even though we just met/ he picked me but we were not bonded at that time - we were after all that!
So just cross that bridge when you get to it
D. ( previous grey) had to take meds all day long for months, she stayed completely loving (and still in pain, that is why she is no longer here, unfortunately).


Well done about getting your birdie to the vet.

Yeah, it sounds to me like a definite Yeast infection and probably a Bacterial infection as well in her GI Tract...By the way, NEVER allow any Vet to give you ANYTHING to give your bird in her drinking water! I'm actually quite shocked that a CAV would ever prescribe that route of administration in the first place, usually that is done by Exotics Vet. The problem is that two-fold, #1 You have no way of knowing how much of the medication/supplement/vitamin or whatever it is you're putting in their water that they are getting, so they either don't get an adequate dose (this is what usually happens, as with your bird), OR they overdose and become very sick or die; and then #2 Their drinking water becomes immediately contaminated and starts growing Fungi and Bacteria! It's very unsafe and totally ineffective...Always give them oral medications, supplements, vitamins, and anything else directly into their mouth/beak.

***I also highly recommend that you go to any Petco and buy a bottle of Qwiko Avian Probiotics, or any Tractor Supply and buy Benebac Probiotics, and start giving your bird a daily dose starting immediately, and continue it every day for at least a week AFTER she finishes the Antibiotic. I have been giving all of my guys a daily dose of the powdered Qwiko Avian Probiotic every day for years, and they've never once had either a Fungal or Bacterial GI infection. I also take one every morning with my multi-vitamin. Any time anyone takes an Antibiotic, it can kill-off the healthy, normal, "good" Bacteria that lives throughout their GI Tract, which is the only thing that keeps Yeast from growing throughout their GI Tract, and this is the main reason they develop GI Fungal/Yeast infections. A bottle of Qwiko Avian Probioitics only costs $10 and it lasts forever, it comes with a pre-measured little tiny scoop, and all you do is put a scoop-full every morning mixed into either their pellets or their seed-mix. That's it. Again, continue it for at least a week AFTER she finishes the Antibiotic so that all of the healthy, normal Bacteria in her GI Tract is replaced...

***Watch her carefully, and if she has not COMPLETELY STOPPED picking around her vent/tail area by the time she finishes the Antibiotic and the Anti-Fungal, then you need to IMMEDIATELY call your CAV and make an appointment for an X-Ray right away...I wish I had the link to the post written by our other senior member and their Amazon, but I was actually shocked that their CAV caught that Kidney infection on the first appointment by doing an X-Ray, and I was even more shocked about the damage that had already been done to the bird's Kidney and mostly his Spine.

That bird's ONLY symptom, the only one, was their picking around their vent, and it wasn't even being done every day or even every week!!! This senior member had seen their Amazon picking around their vent once in a while for months, but it was so infrequent and because the bird was totally fine otherwise that they thought nothing of it until it had gone on for months and months...And you know how birds are, they hide all outward signs and symptoms of illness for as long as they can...So this bird had hidden all signs of pain, illness, etc. except for a very occasional plucking/itching around his vent...And after months of seeing their bird do this infrequently, this member posted about it here, and I believe I and others told her that it may be a GI Tract infection or some kind of feather-follicle that was infected...She took him to her CAV and they ran a Fecal Culture, blood work, and an X-Ray, just because they wanted to cover all the bases...The blood-work showed nothing but elevated White Blood Cells, and the Fecal didn't show anything I don't think...But that X-Ray!!! I have never seen anything like it, and I have no idea how that Amazon was still eating, moving around and flying normally, and not acting like they were in any pain at all except for that plucking/itching around their vent!!! His right Kidney was SOOOOOO LARGE that it looked like it was ready to burst, literally...And it was so enlarged from the infection that it had been putting pressure on the bird's spine for months, and this causes severe degeneration of his spine in the area the enlarged kidney was pushing on, and you could clearly see that his spine had started to break-down right in that area!

It was such an odd, freak thing that was hidden so well by the bird that there was no bird owner in the world that would have suspected that their bird was at all sick, let alone sick with a potentially fatal infection and spinal-damage because of it. Unfortunately, most bird owners would not have even taken their bird to the Vet in the first-place, as this Amazon wasn't even plucking/itching his vent area even as much as your Love Bird has been, so there is no way that only that would tell most people that something was wrong with their bird (after all, they preen daily anyway)...And what's more impressive is this member's CAV!!! I remember being so very impressed that this CAV took an X-Ray on this bird's first appointment, because I would be willing to be that only 10-20% of all CAVs, probably less than that, even the best in the world, would EVER think to take an X-Ray because a bird present "occasionally plucking/itching the area around their vent a few times a month" with no other signs or symptoms. Most would run blood-work and a Fecal Culture/Gram-Stain, and when the White Blood Cells were elevated and the Fecal showed Bacteria/Fungi, they would have diagnosed the bird with a GI Tract infection and given the appropriate med for it, and that would be it...and the bird would likely suddenly crash at some point all at once and in a lot of cases die suddenly and without warning...So that CAV quite literally saved that bird's life and also saved his spine from becoming permanently damaged and the bird disabled...

***So, my point to this whole rambling post is that If your bird finishes the entire round of both the Antibiotic and the Anti-Fungal meds and she is still plucking/itching around her vent/tail/leg areas, please call your CAV immediately, like the day she finishes the meds, and take her back demanding a regular X-Ray! I'm not trying to be an alarmist, but after seeing that entire episode with that member's Amazon and the total lack of any other signs/symptoms, and then seeing that X-Ray, you can bet that if any of my birds EVER start plucking/itching continuously around their vent/tail area they are getting an X-Ray done immediately!!!

If I can find that thread I'll post a link to it here, because it's an interesting read as it matches-up exactly with what your bird has been doing, and the diagnosis was so unexpected...and that X-Ray is something to see, it really showed me just how well birds really do hide all outward signs and symptoms of illness and pain for months and months...

EllenD, thank you very much for all the great information! I am going to go get the probiotics today. My bird is a pretty picky eater. If I put a scoop on her seeds, would she be able to avoid eating it? She doesn't eat mushy things like oatmeal or most fruits and vegetables. Her main food are the roudybush pellets mixed with some zupreem pellets.

Yeah, I questioned the effectiveness of treating the original yeast infection with meds mixed in the water. They offered me both options, but made it sound like they were both equal in effectiveness, so I opted for the easier option because I didn't know any better. I'm feeling pretty stupid because it really doesn't make sense now that I really think about it. Ugh! I'm not crazy about my CAV. He doesn't really explain anything unless I repeated ask what certain things mean. I trusted him because he has a very good reputation in my area and a lot of experience. This is a tough time because my husband is against spending money on pets like this. He told me I could buy several new lovebirds with the amount I spent at the vet. [emoji3525] I just want my little Boo Boo to be okay again!

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Every few days, I make a batch of oatmeal (boil water, add whole mashed banana and sometimes other fruit...then add oats and cook for 5 minutes). I give my bird a tiny bit of oatmeal each morning and evening, as she thinks it is a treat and it allows me to mix in the probiotics...I started this after she had a weird gram-stain (hardly any bacteria at all...good or bad). Anyway, now I do it daily. DO make sure you don't give excessive amounts of probiotics (or oatmeal for that matter lol). For my Umbrella cockatoo, I do 1/4 tsp of the powder 2x daily....The vet said I shouldn't exceed that amount based on her size and weight. I use Bene-Bac. I have found that oatmeal is the only semi-healthy wet food that she doesn't get sick of. Her poop looks so much better now--- recently had a gram-stain done because she was being weird and I wanted to make sure she didn't have an infection. The vet said her bacterial levels looked, "BEAUTIFUL" lol. I have been doing this for about a year and her blood, weight and poop have been normal every time.

I might be paranoid for saying this, but I am uncomfortable sprinkling powder on dried food because I don't want my bird to breathe it in...Plus, I am pretty sure it would just settle at the bottom of the dish with enough rooting around. If you bird eats fruit or vegetables of any kind, the moisture on these might help it stick better. You could also mist her dry food with water to help it stick but you would have to throw it out within a few hours, wash the dish and replace with dry food...so that could end up wasting a lot.

I have no tractor supply stores near me, so I will be getting the Quiko brand from Petco. The only thing besides pellets and seeds that I can get Boo Boo to eat is a bit of cooked white rice and sometimes a bit of chicken. But even that is in pretty small amounts so I don't know how I'd get her to take a dose. She weighs 39 oz, so she wouldn't need much probably. She's tiny!

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Try the rice then...or even the sprouts...Just something wet that it will stick to. You can also order stuff online. Amazon is my best friend these days.

I got the probiotics and sprinkled a small amount on her seeds. Tomorrow I will try to give her some on some wet food. How much should I be giving her? She weighs 39oz. I don't give her nearly 4oz of seeds like the package says to measure the probiotics by, so it would be a lot less. She did well taking her meds today. She does try to hide every time she sees me coming though. [emoji3525]

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