Blood on Budgies Face

[JSyle]

So when I woke up and went to feed my birds this morning, I was greeted with the horrifying sights of what I believe to be blood on one of my budgies (attached pictures). As far as my boyfriend is aware, they were perfectly fine last night when he put them to bed (I work at night so I didn't see them) and I woke up at 9 this morning so they've most likely only been up for about an hour at most. The blood seems to be dry and he is acting normally, eating, flying, etc. My first thought was that my other budgie may have attacked him, so I was setting up my little dinky pet store cage that I bought as a carrier so I could separate them, but as I was watching them, they seemed perfectly fine, and if anything the one that was injured was being more antagonistic than the other and that's pretty much how they always are. So I was trying to think, and my mind landed on a blood feather, he has tons of pin feathers on his head right now as all my birds are molting, but then I've always believed with blood feathers that there would be a lot more blood. Besides what's on his face, I dont see any more. Maybe it's not blood? I don't know, any help you guys can offer?

 

[Scott]

Appears to be blood, are there any toys that ooze red when wet? If blood, not sure if locally generated, ie top of head. Are you able to inspect by moving feathers and observing status of the base - that would be source of blood. Is there any trace of blood on the other bird?

 

[Laurasea]

To me it looks like bird vomit, when they vomit they shake their head and it gets everywhere... his crop looks very full..like unusually full
or he got some sort of food on himself or made burd soup in water???

Cute little birds

 

[bug_n_flock]

I agree with Laura. Looks more like vomit than blood. What do they eat? Anything red/orange?

 

[Teddscau]

Definitely vomit. I'd recommend getting a crop and a cloacal swab to test for avian gastric yeast (get a gram stain and ideally a PCR if possible), as well as a gram stain on fresh feces. In my experience, vomiting means AGY. If it is AGY, it isn't nearly as big of a deal as most websites would have you believe, but it is highly contagious (but manageable and not a death sentence).

On a side note, my budgies are sensitive to sweet potato and will projectile vomit if they eat any.