How to Properly hold a bird to check its flight wings?

Hi everyone, so today I brought home our new Pacific parrotlet, the owner of the store is required to cut its flight feathers before he can sell them and he did with no issues. about 10 min ago my little fella was jumping around and i noticed blood on the cage and then took him out and saw that one of his feathers was bleeding. It was not bleeding when the feathers were cut so Im guessing he just cut very close and the bird was messing with his toys and managed to rub it wrong maybe? It seems like it has stopped bleeding but just am curious as to how you hold a parrotlet still enough to open its wings to check without risking him getting hurt or me getting bit(I tried to a few different times and each time his little head was still able to reach for my thumb lol.

A vet (certified avian preferred) would be able to help get a really good look at the wing to determine if it was cut too short or if the blood feather is still bleeding and needs to be pulled. Left alone to bleed they will bleed out so its important to make sure the bleeding is stopped.

Besides a vet, you may have to gently restrain the bird with your hand (you can use a glove or washcloth to keep from getting bit) and gently extend the wing to get a good view of it and determine if its not bleeding anymore. It happens and as owners we have to do things to ensure our birds are physically okay and that may mean handling them when they don't like it.

Good luck!

Thanks for the info, yeah a glove would work perfect! He doesnt bite hard by any means but id rather be safe then sorry haha. The bleeding did stop fairly quick though. Also I was planning to see my aviary vet today for his first check up so this will work perfect.

phthalo said:

Thanks for the info, yeah a glove would work perfect! He doesnt bite hard by any means but id rather be safe then sorry haha. The bleeding did stop fairly quick though. Also I was planning to see my aviary vet today for his first check up so this will work perfect.

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The avian vet can/will show you how to properly hold the little guy properly also. good luck with his check-up!


Jim

How did your vet visit go? Tell us all about your new little friend! This forum needs more parrotlets!

Inger said:

How did your vet visit go? Tell us all about your new little friend! This forum needs more parrotlets!

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Back for an update! I wanted to give it a few days just to get to know him a little better and understand his habits slightly before giving an update on our new little buddy. We decided to keep the same name as our first one who sadly passed away after one day with us. Phthalo seems to be doing good though!

We took him to the vet last friday. The Vet gave us some great advice on keeping him along with detials about their health and care ( we had researched allot, but sitting in person with a vet for well over an hour just talking about daily care and needs was amazing and very knowledgeable). We had a poop sample taken to test for anything bad and it came out negative which was good news. The day before the vet visit I ended up having to pluck one of his blood feathers as he had injured it and it kept bleeding so I googled it and thankfully got it right the first time! The vet was a little shocked that I was bold enough to do it because I guess if not done properly you can pluck wrong and break it off without the umbilicus which can be very bad and lead to great loss of blood as she stated when done properly it should barely bleed at all for a second or two and stop quickly, to my surprise when i plucked it, there was no blood what so ever haha. She did check his flight feathers and he is unable to properly glide without falling too fast to the ground. His weight was 26grams and she said he could gain a few more grams but this was a good weight. Also the vet did say that UVB bulbs didnt help and he should be outside in the sun at least once a week for a little bit of time (supervised to make sure he doesnt over heat), but I was wondering if yall have had good luck with them as if yall have a different opinion on them I would love to try it still.

today I noticed he has new feathers growing on top of his head so maybe he is starting to molt? Not entirely sure how to tell but it seems like he has about 4/5 new feathers coming up on his head. He is very active for short parts of the day and seems to have a little nap during the late morning before lunch, and then after lunch for a short time. I was a little worried about him this morning though because he was shivering in his cage and puffed up, but I took him out and held him in a blanket for about 10 min and he stopped. I think he was just cold and was trying to warm up.

Phthalo is very jumpy in his cage when I put my hand in and seems to run away a little but He has no problem climbing on a stick and then i bring him out that way and he seems to prefer that over my finger when getting out of the cage.

As for diet, the vet recommended that I primarily feed pellets and try to only feed a small amount of seed, I told her that He was only on a seed diet after being weened from him baby food from the breeder so Currently im trying to get him to eat pellets. He doesn't seem to have any interest though. Its hard to tell if he is eating them as I started with small amounts of pellet with larger amounts of seed and have slowly worked up to 50/50 so far (not adding massive amounts of food but more so enough for one days serving). Today I cut up some different greens along with some carrots and green pepper and jalapeno pepper and put it in a dish to see if he would try some. Not sure if he will but I figured id offer it.

As for giving him a bath or what not, It seems that he doesn't like dishes with water in them for bathing and doesn't like being sprayed by water, and pretty much hates anything to do with water on him lol. I tried to look up videos on this but most just show birds liking it and phthalo seems to hate it. He runs away from the mist, and the dish if He is perched on my finger and I put his feet in the bowl he just hops off my finger and away from the bowl of water, so I am just going to keep trying until I figure out what works best.

I will attach some pictures after this to show y'all him in his new cage along with his new feathers showing up on his head!! Im hoping he is molting though, because I really want him to be able to fly and it sucks that he had to get his flight feathers cut ='(.

P.s

Sorry for the long post, just trying to fit everything in and having a new bird is soo exciting but also so much work, and I just want to make sure I do it the right way for his heath.

It’s great that your vet took so long with you! Mine did as well that first visit, and I got some great information. There’s a lot of controversy/disagreement about lighting-you’re lucky you live in a sunny part of the world! When you take him out, will he be in his cage or will you harness train him?

Bumble likes to drink from the faucet, and that eventually turned into her bathing in the faucet while I mist her from above. Might be worth trying. Oh and always mist from above rather than directly at them. It needs to be like a nice rainfall.

The shivering and puffing up is a little bit of a concern though-is your home thar chilly? I’d keep a very close eye on that, but given your recent experience I’m sure you already know that.

We love pictures here.......hint hint.


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Inger said:

It’s great that your vet took so long with you! Mine did as well that first visit, and I got some great information. There’s a lot of controversy/disagreement about lighting-you’re lucky you live in a sunny part of the world! When you take him out, will he be in his cage or will you harness train him?

Bumble likes to drink from the faucet, and that eventually turned into her bathing in the faucet while I mist her from above. Might be worth trying. Oh and always mist from above rather than directly at them. It needs to be like a nice rainfall.

The shivering and puffing up is a little bit of a concern though-is your home thar chilly? I’d keep a very close eye on that, but given your recent experience I’m sure you already know that.

We love pictures here.......hint hint.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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I watched him all day yesterday making sure he was okay, but the shivering didnt seem to stop. Im not sure if its from him being in a new cage or what, but I am going back to the vet this morning to see if something might have popped up that was not showing before. Id rather be safe then sorry and the house was at 78* F all day yesterday so plenty warm with no fans on him or vents. His poop also changed from a dark color to a more liquid thick green color so we are also a little frightened from that as well. Also what harness do you use for your parrotlet! I have been thinking about doing this and im guessing the earlier the better as id rather him be free to walk then in his cage when outside