Female lovebirds passed away

MiEf

New member
Apr 21, 2014
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United Kingdom
Parrots
Lovebirds Oliver, Sleepy and Lilly
Hi guys, I would much appreciate your help with my lovie problem.

We bought 4 lovebirds last year (they were our first ones, black masked green were the boys and black masked in blue variation were te girls), they paired up nicely after some time but never bred and females never laid eggs.

A couple of months back we noticed one female, Pinky Beak, became ill, she wasnt able to fly at all and we took her to a certified vet, she had xrays done and poo samples and was diagnosed with Aspergillosis. We ve done all we were told by vet, changing diet completely, got a UV light and gave her the medication for a couple of months, she was getting so much better, she put on weight (she only weighed 20g in her worst :() she was able to fly bits by bits and yet, after 4 months since being diagnosed she passed away this morning. I found her at the bottom of the cage, she must have fallen out from their little snuggly hut at night I think :(

Her cage mate seems to be doing ok though, he saw her body so I assume he understands she s gone. They were very close, he was feeding her all the time and helping her when she was too weak and such. The other pair is in a seperate cage but we got used to putting them close to each other and they also had a lot of exercise and we let them fly around all four together. We re now thinking what we re going to do with the poor boy who s alone now -- i m not sure if we want to go down the route of getting a new girl for him -- it s never too certain whether they bond or not and i would need the third cage. Do you think he ll be ok with the other two lovies in another cage? Can he stay in his cage on his own? He s doing ok at the moment although it has only been a couple of hours -- he s eqting, chirping, sleeping.... They would often visit each other s cages as well and he tends to sit near the other cage so we were thinking maybe putting all three together? The other pair s not a breeding pair either, they are cage mates, a couple but they bicker a fair bit (never too aggressively).

I m really not sure but the idea of going through quarantine, waiting if they bond or not doesnt appeal to me too much but would go that way if need be. What do you think?
 
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MonicaMc

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Sep 12, 2012
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Mitred Conure - Charlie 1994;
Cockatiel - Casey 2001;
Wild Caught ARN - Sylphie 2013
If all three lovies get along fine and none of them are sick, you could house them all in one cage as long as they get along and the cage was large enough.


Sorry to hear you lost one hen. :( If you don't mind me asking, what is the cage substrate?
 
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MiEf

New member
Apr 21, 2014
4
0
United Kingdom
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Lovebirds Oliver, Sleepy and Lilly
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Thank you very much for replying. I think the cage should be big enough, we ve got Montana San diego cages for both pairs (Montana San Diego Parrot Cage | Cockatiel Cages | Conure Cages - Parrotize UK) and we put newspaper at the bottom which they do have access to but we change it on a daily basis. We dont use sand if thats what you were getting at?

As for the health of the other birdies, they seem fine, we gave them a course of Sporanox as a preventive measure which was advised by our vet. After having her xray done, it showed PinkyBeak had small bits lodged in her stomach which vet said might have been some lead or other heavy metal so we re not actually sure if thats what got her in the end or if it was Aspergillosis :( they werent able to take her blood since she was ever so tiny...

It s just such a shame because she seemed to have been the 'ringleader' -- she was always first to try new food (they arent too keen on fruit and veg but would copy her if she tried) and now it s gonna be even harder to get them to try new things :/

I guess we ll try to leave it as it is but will let them out to exercise more often to see if they ll not end up in just one cage themselves...

Thanks a lot for your reply, much appreciate it.
 
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MonicaMc

Well-known member
Sep 12, 2012
7,960
Media
2
43
Parrots
Mitred Conure - Charlie 1994;
Cockatiel - Casey 2001;
Wild Caught ARN - Sylphie 2013
Cage size looks ok.


I was asking about the cage substrate as a possible source of aspergillus. Corn cobb is one potential substrate that'll grow mold spores! Unfortunately, so is newspaper. Knock on wood, I haven't had any issues with that as I do use paper on my cage bottoms as well. In fact, it's used by thousands of owners! Could be just a rare occurrence of it happening.



You *can* take blood from a lovebird, but it may take more than one trip to the vet to get enough blood without causing harm to the bird. My bourke parakeet weighs 35-44 grams and I've had bloodwork and surgery done on her. Lovebirds are typically just a bit bigger than she is.




Hopefully things work out for the best for your remaining lovies. :)
 

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