Training for when your bird gets sick

Of course we would all like to think that if we feed our birds well and keep cages and other things clean, our birds will never get sick. Sadly, not that long ago my Nanday conure did get sick. We never were certain with what, but one thing I had to do was to give her an oral antibiotic and an oral anti-inflammatory through a syringe. Of course animals don't understand why we are doing such things to them, and birds are especially intelligent. Within one day she didn't want to come out of her cage anymore and I would have to catch her in a towel. Of course after the medication, I played with her for a long time to make it up to her, but she knew that twice a day I was going to do this.

I got some great advice a few weeks ago from someone who runs a bird rescue. She suggested I pick up some hand feeding formula and work with the birds on eating it from a syringe in order to train them to accept one for when/if they get sick. I said yes, I've been through this once with my conure and that does seem like a good idea.

Once you have them eating it, I don't know that you should do this daily, but every few days might be a good idea to keep that training going for the day you might have no choice but to do it.

I once did something similar with one of my horses who would only allow me to give her shots. I had other people pretend they were giving her a shot with a syringe that had no needle. Once she got used to them approaching her with it and pretending to stick it in her neck, the vet was able to give her shots.

Just thought I'd pass this advice along for other bird owners. If it helps to keep you from having to "terrorize" your bird in the event of illness, it's a good thing

My original flock and two other budgies of mine love the syringe
Three were raised with it ( my babies ), their parents figured it out when they saw their bubs eating from it, and the other two are bonded with members of my original flock, so they picked it up that way.
Makes it a whole lot easier, for example, I probably wouldn't have been able to save Chubsy ( he was attacked by a rat a few weeks ago ) if he wasn't happy to take electrolytes and hand rearing formula from my syringe.
And Elly too, now that I think about it ( egg peritonitis ). And Marigold ( egg binding ).
Lol if I walked into my aviary right now with a syringe, I'd get attacked.
I'd definitely recommend teaching your birds to accept medication and food from a syringe!

Many of the oral antibiotics can be given on something like a piece of bread, if powdered sprinkle on favorite wet food (orange,grape,etc) this works for things like Batril. Mycam (inflammatory) is bitter and you might have to give with a syringe but sometime your vet can flavor it ,so you can put it on a favorite food. All of my birds where raised on the syringe with formula and love to be fed that way as a treat, but once they get the taste of Rx in the syringe they want nothing to do with it. My advice, get your fid to where you can handle them and give meds as quick and matter of fact as possible. Even birds that i have to give injections to will quickly forget my handling them if i interact with them every day, not just when medicating them.

If its late at night and you have no way to get some handfeeding formula, you can make some yourself. One of the most basic formula you can make to get by is hard boiled egg yolk and cottage cheese. Gotta get some yogurt too as meds kills good and bad bacteria. Mash up cottage cheese with yolk and mix a little water and feed it with a syringe like formula. My birds loved it when they were sick with a contagious virus. I had to give them meds twice a day....

Both my birds were hand fed, but the problem is they are 12 and 28 years old now. I don't think they remember their hand feeding days. Those of you who kept up with this did the right thing. I didn't, never realizing I could have a problem (ignorant I guess).

Yes, you can put medications on half a Nutriberry and let it dry my vet told me. But, I thought if I could train them to the syringe, that's better since I will know for a fact they got every bit of it.

I figured there might be others like me who didn't think to continue syringe feeding their weaned birds and that this advice might help them.

I did not keep up with the syringe either. But they did just fine and I had a few that was wild, they did fine too. They know when your trying to help! I even fed my feral girl cat meds with syringe and she did fine. Even though she's super sweet now, but she used to be afraid of everything.....as long as the animal your trying to help knows what your trying to do, they don't generally fight you on it...at least that's been my experience. When my animals are sick they come straight to me, even the ones that goes to my partner. They seem to know who to depend on when they need something...lol...brats...

I admit, my Nanday is kind of a booger. She loves to come out and play and interact with me, but she is not a cuddly bird. She usually doesn't like to be touched except for kisses. Luckily she takes care of her toenails herself by filing them on her cement perch, because she gets really upset if she even sees me cutting my own nails, lol!

The new zon is happily taking food from the syringe so far and my Nanday is like, get that away from me!

The funny part is she is my best behaved bird at the vet's. That boldness she has serves her well in new places with new people.

My cat is also not good about taking pills. But, I just have to pet on her and love her after and I'm instantly forgiven. And she seems to understand that the vet is helping her with her bladder infections, and behaves well there. She just doesn't get that the pills are part of her getting better. I had a dog that had to take medication daily and he was very good about it. I just had to say, "Dommie, time for your pill." And he would come and sit in front of me. Yes, the animals do mostly come to me if they get hurt or sick. They just don't always connect the treatment with the illness or injury. If a horse gets a cut on it's shoulder and comes to me for help, it seems to understand my treating the cut. What it doesn't seem to understand are the anti biotics. But, they do love molasses so you smash the pills up, mix with molasses in the syringe and they will happily eat it. But, yeah, trying to get a horse to actually eat 10 pills twice a day is probably an exercise in futility if you don't do the syringe thing.

It made me chuckle when you talk about giving dog meds. One of my dog used to take meds twice a day for a very long time. He loves to take meds, he's the only one gobble up his heartworm meds very quickly....lol