Bird mite infestation - help and advice please?

[nkrbkr]

Is it the seeds in the nutriberries that cause hormonal behavior? The pellets? Or the stuff that holds them together?
Her bird Salvador is obviously hormonal already since she just laid eggs and it sounds like she eats chop and a seed mix. Do you think chop may cause hormonal behavior because it's a moist food? I don't know what's in her chop but some chops have a lot of grains, rice, beans and pasta plus veggies.

I think it’s the extra seeds, the peanuts, & probably the sugar (they have corn syrup in them) that triggers Button. I can’t feed him any seed as part of his daily diet. Treats only. I’ve never noticed chop being an issue for him, unless there’s an excessive amount of grains/rice/pasta.

 

[rheashard2]

Glad it's not mites. Getting a bird to eat healthy can be a battle. There are lots of good pellet brands out there. Nutra-berries are one. Check out other threads here. There's pros and cons about every pellet brand. Investigate before you decide. Nutraberries makes a pellet type and treats. I thought it was treats only too. Theres plenty of chop recipes here that my CAG will actually eat. I can vary it so boredom isn't an issue. I make chop that is bird safe. To save money and decrease waste, the chop is something that I will eat. It's added to soup, scrambled eggs, casseroles, pasta and whatever else I feel like. The biggest advantage is my CAG sees me eating her food. This motivates her to eat her chop.

 

[The Green Demon]

Im glad shes got a clean bill of health. What did they say about her eggs? Are you going to take them away from her?
Does she eat her chop? What's in her chop? Nutriberries are good but expensive but since she's an only bird it won't be too expensive. You can crush them and put them in her chop. She may also like LaFeber's AviCakes.

When I have to medicate my budgies (we all hate it) I hold then in a towel and put the medicine right in their beak. If I have to put a bird into a carrier and they don't want to go I put a small towel over them and physically put them in. Not fun but they get over it.

He wasn't too concerned about the eggs. He said to leave them until she rejects them. She went straight back to them when we returned. Basically, she ignored me for the first couple of hours.

She used to be really good at eating her chop, but very recently, she has become less interested to the point of nearly ignoring it. Even her favourite foods like oranges, figs, and apples don't get a look in, which I am a little confused about. This has only been over the last couple of weeks, so I can only guess it has something to do with sitting on a clutch.

I mistakenly bought a bag of Nutriberries from the vets—extortionate! She ate the first one and has turned her beak up at them since. I will try the crushing thing, though. Thank you.

With reference to the medication, it is a small amount and I have been able to give it to her off my finger. She takes water this way from me, and she thinks I am just giving her water. I probably wouldn't use a towel with her, but it is a good idea in case of an emergency. I generally can coerce her in. I think the problem yesterday was because she was desperate to get to her eggs.

I actually read about those LaFeber's AviCakes yesterday when I was researching about converting a bird from seed to pellets. I do worry, that as she is an older bird this is going to be like teaching a dog new tricks, but I will give it another go.

Appreciate your support. Thank you

 

[The Green Demon]

Glad it's not mites. Getting a bird to eat healthy can be a battle. There are lots of good pellet brands out there. Nutra-berries are one. Check out other threads here. There's pros and cons about every pellet brand. Investigate before you decide. Nutraberries makes a pellet type and treats. I thought it was treats only too. Theres plenty of chop recipes here that my CAG will actually eat. I can vary it so boredom isn't an issue. I make chop that is bird safe. To save money and decrease waste, the chop is something that I will eat. It's added to soup, scrambled eggs, casseroles, pasta and whatever else I feel like. The biggest advantage is my CAG sees me eating her food. This motivates her to eat her chop.

I will look for some of the other threads for ideas with chop recipes. We have a couple that she usually dives into, but as I mentioned in a previous reply, she doesn't seem interested in anything other than seed currently, which is a big behaviour change. I do wonder if it has to do with the energy expenditure needed for sitting on a clutch, and so she is searching for high-calorie foods. Its interesting that you use the chop as well. And that when your CAG sees you eating her food, she is more interested. Salvador will only try something that she sees me eating first. I thought I might try this with the pellets. I feel I could be more creative with her chop, maybe that will get her interested again. Thanks for the motivation.

 

[The Green Demon]

I’m so happy to hear she doesn’t have mites! I practice carrier training with both of my birds, so that they are not scared or hesitant to go in. This is something I would just do periodically to get your bird used to it. Use a high value treat to coax her into the carrier on her own terms. Let her go in, get the treat, & come out right away if she wants. Eventually, you can close the carrier, and give her treats after you do so. She’ll gradually start to get used to it and understand the carrier=treats.

I don’t feed my lovebird Nutriberries. I tried giving them as a treat periodically, but they always sent him over the edge with hormonal behavior. That said, he is VERY sensitive to any changes to his diet. I now give the Nutriberries as a treat only to my Amazon.

Below is a link to a thread where I posted how you can convert your bird to pellets. I think the easiest way to do it is by using birdie bread. I’m happy to send the recipe I use as well, if you’d like. Just be sure to weigh your bird daily while doing any sort of diet conversion, to make sure she is eating enough and not losing weight.

Thread 'Adopted a Galah- seeking advice'
https://www.parrotforums.com/threads/adopted-a-galah-seeking-advice.105548/

I was pleased it wasn't mites as well, but I do feel there is still something going on. Keeping a close eye on her though.

I had been doing carrier training. I moved fairly recently, and I wanted to get her used to it. I had cats before who eventually loved being in their carriers, so I wanted to do something similar for her. But she has a very determined character, and she also gets bored easily, so if the carrier is out too often, she takes no notice of it. I will get back to doing this with her again. A bit of pecan is her high-reward treat, probably the only one I found that she will do almost anything for, but it wasn't working on Monday! Haha.

I agree about using Nutriberries periodically as a treat. From most of the research and reading that I have done, it isn't something I want to fee her exclusively, which is counter to the advice from the vet yesterday, who gave me the advice that just Nutriberries and no pellets would be better than just the seed and chop,. I offered her one not long ago after removing her seed so it was her only option. She will often eat from my hand, and she surprisingly tucked into it. She still seems to just be picking out her favourites. I will return her usual seed mix later, obviously not going to starve her. Just challenging her pickiness. I do feel I use a higher quality feed, which isn't just full of cheap ingredients, bulked out with a load of rubbish. But I do use foraging with millet, another one of her favourites, but she has to work for it. She has to fly around to find it, as it's hidden in different cups, toys and containers around the house. Her chop is basically a selection of fruits and vegetables, like carrots, broccoli, red pepper, and apple etc with a tablespoon of ground flaxseed mixed in, chia seeds, linseeds, a small pinch of rolled oats and occasionally hemp hearts if I have them in. I felt like this was a good mix, and usually when she is hunting for the chia, she is getting her beak full of veggies. I will look for some more recipes now.

Thank you for the link. I will have a look as I am keen to get her converted. I weigh her regularly anyway. It is something I have done since I first had to her to make sure she was eating enough when I tried making the transition before. A birdie bread recipe would be great, thank you. She does enjoy my seeded rye bread when I am having some, so she may like something like this.

Thank you for taking time to respond.

 

[The Green Demon]

I'm kinda curious. One of your posts said you saw a mite. Are you sure what you saw was a mite?

Well, I definitely saw several small insects on the unit where her cage sits, around her cage, and on one of her external perches. Her cage sits on an IKEA Kalex unit, one of those four-square type things, that has wicker-type baskets underneath it. I think there was some type of insect living in them, and possibly enjoying the extra bits of seed, etc. that were being dropped by the bird. I did semi-squish one, photograph it and put it through Google Lens, which suggested it could be mites, hence the assumption. And then that, coupled with her quite insistent scratching, I was pretty convinced that was the issue.

I immediately removed the baskets and cleaned the unit with a mixture of vinegar and water. I threw away the wicker square baskets because gross, mites or not mites, still insects in the house and near her cage are unacceptable. For the first couple of days, they were still around, but I was pretty vigilant with cleaning and vacuuming, and I also bought a mite spray that I used in the cracks and crevices of the unit, on her perches, and around her cage. Her cage was cleaned to the best of my ability, without removing her nest, as I was holding off until I spoke to the vet. I didn't want to stress her more than was necessary until it was all confirmed. All rope perches were taken out, all perches were deep cleaned, as were her food and water dishes. I do this kind of deep clean once per month, normally anyway, but I hadn't recently due to the new clutch.

I am still not utterly convinced about the mites. The vet said he saw none on her. She had a lot of pin feathers and new feather growth around her head, which may be why she is scratching. But this isn't something that has happened before, so I'm keeping a close eye on her. It was good to get her checked, as she hasn't been to a vet in at least two years. And as I mentioned before, the woman didn't even touch her. It was reassuring to hear she is healthy, and at a good weight without any mites.

So long story. But maybe I didn't see a mite

 

[nkrbkr]

I was pleased it wasn't mites as well, but I do feel there is still something going on. Keeping a close eye on her though.

I had been doing carrier training. I moved fairly recently, and I wanted to get her used to it. I had cats before who eventually loved being in their carriers, so I wanted to do something similar for her. But she has a very determined character, and she also gets bored easily, so if the carrier is out too often, she takes no notice of it. I will get back to doing this with her again. A bit of pecan is her high-reward treat, probably the only one I found that she will do almost anything for, but it wasn't working on Monday! Haha.

I agree about using Nutriberries periodically as a treat. From most of the research and reading that I have done, it isn't something I want to fee her exclusively, which is counter to the advice from the vet yesterday, who gave me the advice that just Nutriberries and no pellets would be better than just the seed and chop,. I offered her one not long ago after removing her seed so it was her only option. She will often eat from my hand, and she surprisingly tucked into it. She still seems to just be picking out her favourites. I will return her usual seed mix later, obviously not going to starve her. Just challenging her pickiness. I do feel I use a higher quality feed, which isn't just full of cheap ingredients, bulked out with a load of rubbish. But I do use foraging with millet, another one of her favourites, but she has to work for it. She has to fly around to find it, as it's hidden in different cups, toys and containers around the house. Her chop is basically a selection of fruits and vegetables, like carrots, broccoli, red pepper, and apple etc with a tablespoon of ground flaxseed mixed in, chia seeds, linseeds, a small pinch of rolled oats and occasionally hemp hearts if I have them in. I felt like this was a good mix, and usually when she is hunting for the chia, she is getting her beak full of veggies. I will look for some more recipes now.

Thank you for the link. I will have a look as I am keen to get her converted. I weigh her regularly anyway. It is something I have done since I first had to her to make sure she was eating enough when I tried making the transition before. A birdie bread recipe would be great, thank you. She does enjoy my seeded rye bread when I am having some, so she may like something like this.

Thank you for taking time to respond.

Here is the bird bread recipe. It’s from Jen (The Green Bird Brigade on Instagram). Both of my birds love it, & I recently used it to convert my Amazon to pellets. She was previously on a mostly birdie junk food diet when I adopted her. This recipe calls for TOPs pellets, which is what I use, but you can substitute with the pellets you intend to use.

I’ll add that some pellet brands have their own bird bread mix, which can be a helpful tool, if you need a bit of an extra push to finish converting. For example, I started using this homemade bird bread, eventually adding in more pellets. Ava still wasn’t eating all the pellets on their own, so I got TOPs’ bird bread mix (which is made of the same ingredients as the pellets), and started putting a small chunk in with the homemade bird bread. Eventually, she was just eating the TOPs bread, & now she eats the pellets on their own like crazy. She loves them. It can be a bit of a gradual process, but I think it’s well worth it.

One of the most helpful things is to start by mixing a food your bird loves into the bread to get them tasting it (same goes for getting a bird to eat chop). If you try out the homemade bread, I would start by sprinkling some of your bird’s seed mix into it (even kind of mash it in) to get her digging around & tasting the bread.

Now that both of my birds are on the same diet (they both eat chop & TOPs), I use the leftover frozen bread as occasional treats, or to celebrate special occasions (hatch days, gotcha days, etc.). I hope this helps! If you decide to try it, keep us posted on how it goes!

 

[rheashard2]

Birdie bread can make a fun treat. Fine chop pecans, pistachios, sunflower seeds etc and mix in. I've even added fine chopped 'dreads' to it. The dreads are broccoli, carrots etc. Nameliss now will eat dreads. Inconsistently but she eats them. No reason why it shouldn't work for pellets.

 

[Geslina]

I have been feeding my parrot Nutriberries for years, he gets 8-10 a day, though he doesn’t actually eat that whole amount, mostly he just breaks them up, all total he maybe eats 4-5 at the most. I never heard anything bad about them, and since one of the ingredients are pellets, I was happy because he won’t eat pellets. Now I am going to try to get him on pellets again, since the vet said he is a little overweight and has the early signs of atherosclerosis. She said it was very common for older amazons, but could be some of the table food I give him too.

I used to bird sit a friend’s macaw. Very sweet bird who would put her face up against yours…but every time she did, I would wind up with itchy welts on my face, so I thought she might have mites - but when I said something to my friend about it, she got all insulted!

 

[texsize]

As far as lice I ran across this recently.

 

[DonnaBudgie]

Interesting! Thanks for posting it.

 

[The Green Demon]

I have been feeding my parrot Nutriberries for years, he gets 8-10 a day, though he doesn’t actually eat that whole amount, mostly he just breaks them up, all total he maybe eats 4-5 at the most. I never heard anything bad about them, and since one of the ingredients are pellets, I was happy because he won’t eat pellets. Now I am going to try to get him on pellets again, since the vet said he is a little overweight and has the early signs of atherosclerosis. She said it was very common for older amazons, but could be some of the table food I give him too.

I used to bird sit a friend’s macaw. Very sweet bird who would put her face up against yours…but every time she did, I would wind up with itchy welts on my face, so I thought she might have mites - but when I said something to my friend about it, she got all insulted!

Thank you for this. Salvador does the same with her Nutriberries. Just nibbles at a few bits until they fall apart. I think I through away at least half of them. But it does mean I have reduced the amount of seed she is currently getting.

Odd that your friend was so insulted. I was kind of grossed out, only because I have a phobia around parasitic insects. The thought of something living on her blood was enough to instigate a full-blown cage and environment clean!

 

[Geslina]

Here is the bird bread recipe. It’s from Jen (The Green Bird Brigade on Instagram). Both of my birds love it, & I recently used it to convert my Amazon to pellets. She was previously on a mostly birdie junk food diet when I adopted her. This recipe calls for TOPs pellets, which is what I use, but you can substitute with the pellets you intend to use.

I’ll add that some pellet brands have their own bird bread mix, which can be a helpful tool, if you need a bit of an extra push to finish converting. For example, I started using this homemade bird bread, eventually adding in more pellets. Ava still wasn’t eating all the pellets on their own, so I got TOPs’ bird bread mix (which is made of the same ingredients as the pellets), and started putting a small chunk in with the homemade bird bread. Eventually, she was just eating the TOPs bread, & now she eats the pellets on their own like crazy. She loves them. It can be a bit of a gradual process, but I think it’s well worth it.

One of the most helpful things is to start by mixing a food your bird loves into the bread to get them tasting it (same goes for getting a bird to eat chop). If you try out the homemade bread, I would start by sprinkling some of your bird’s seed mix into it (even kind of mash it in) to get her digging around & tasting the bread.

Now that both of my birds are on the same diet (they both eat chop & TOPs), I use the leftover frozen bread as occasional treats, or to celebrate special occasions (hatch days, gotcha days, etc.). I hope this helps! If you decide to try it, keep us posted on how it goes!

View attachment 81910

I was going to try this recipe a while back, bought most of the ingredients - but then I bought the Tops Blueberry Burst bread mix. I followed the recipe exactly. Max wouldn’t eat it. The rabbit wouldn’t eat it. I threw what was left outside under the bird feeder, for the birds, the squirrels, maybe the raccoons or opossums…and even they wouldn’t eat it. Have to say, don’t blame them. It looked and smelled kind of gross.

 

[nkrbkr]

I was going to try this recipe a while back, bought most of the ingredients - but then I bought the Tops Blueberry Burst bread mix. I followed the recipe exactly. Max wouldn’t eat it. The rabbit wouldn’t eat it. I threw what was left outside under the bird feeder, for the birds, the squirrels, maybe the raccoons or opossums…and even they wouldn’t eat it. Have to say, don’t blame them. It looked and smelled kind of gross.

lol. That’s interesting! Both of my birds like the TOPs bread, although it isn’t the blueberry one that I bought.

 

[rheashard2]

People can take insult for odd reasons. They may feel that it reflects on lack of care and cleanliness. I feel that it may be a combination of things. Individual sensitivity is a factor. My daughter can get bit by a flea or mosquito and no apparent problem. I get bit with results of large bumps, that itch like crazy.

 

[DonnaBudgie]

The mosquito bite ultra sensitivity is very much an individual thing. There's probably some allergy/ immune response involved. I get crazy itchy bumps and my husband never does.