You know, there's no reason he can't wear clothes the rest of his life. We do, right? A sock sweater, a fringey collar, not the big uncomfortable cone but something that keeps him from plucking. Even if he had to wear a sweater for six months, and then something less restricting for another six months, that's not too bad if it breaks the habit. There's no law that says parrots have to be sane! If Gary were living in the wild, he would be too busy to pluck feathers so he's already living an unnatural life. Let him wear clothes for as long as he needs, maybe experiment with different materials.
Good suggestion, I know lots of parrots that wear a cone full-time, usually for the same reason of plucking, and the sweater sock idea is a lot more comfortable and less hindering than an E-Collar is. So I agree, until you get the wing to stop opening up I'd keep the sweater on him at all times. Not only will it allow new feathers to grow back and keep him from damaging his follicles to the point where feathers will no longer grow back, but if he wears the sweater for a long enough period of time and is unable to pluck for a long period of time, often this alone will stop the plucking. It's like they forget about being able to pluck or they stop "needing" to pluck or the "cravings" to pluck go away.
Something to think about trying with his wing is home physical therapy. I have a bachelor's degree in health science/pre-med and a master's degree in the same, and I had a very heavy emphasis in athletic training and biomechanics, as Lock Haven University of Pennsylvania has one of the country's foremost athletic training programs. I was thinking about Gary and his problem the other day (probably because I know how annoying the adhesions that I had were and I totally understand why he plucks that area) and though an avian vet/surgeon isn't going to be able to cut his adhesions to release them (not large enough an area), physical therapy is often used in both people and animals to both break up the scar tissue and as well as stretch the scar tissue out so it will no longer bother him or tear apart when he opens his wings up.
Doing physical therapy once daily on Gary's wing (while in the meantime he wears the sweater full-time) for 15-20 minutes can very quickly break the scar tissue up, and make it much more flexible to allow his wings to move freely without any tugging or ultimately ripping.
Think of it like working to loosen up hamstrings to allow a person's legs to move more freely and with more flexibility without any stretching or painful tugging or feeling of resistance, and ultimately tearing. With scar tissue under his wing preventing his wing to move freely, I'd design the physical therapy to consist of a combination of both massage therapy directly to the area for 10 minutes a day, this is to slowly break up the scar tissue, and then another 10 minutes a day of gentle, repetitive stretching of the area of scar tissue under the wing. This process of redesigning the collagen cells that make up scar tissue in order to allow them to stretch and move freely is called "Remodeling". It's a practice often done during physical therapy sessions, especially where an athlete that has to be able to move freely has had surgery or multiple surgeries, and has built up a large amount of very strong, high-tensile scar tissue that keeps him from moving a body part freely without pain and tension. And when we're talking about a bird's wings, they have many tendons and ligaments that attach right where his injury was, so he's most likely got a bunch of scar tissue on his tendons and ligaments that move his wing, along with scar tissue under and in his multiple skin layers, and this is what is causing him to tear.
I'd also start applying vitamin E once daily to the area under his wing that tears. We would do this to athletes that had knee surgery and had a large scar on the front of their knee, and that scar tissue kept them from stretching and moving their legs fully. Vitamin E not only would lubricate the outer scar tissue and skin prior to us doing scar massage, but vitamin E is able to penetrate skin and collagen cells when it is rubbed directly into the scar and the skin surrounding the scar. After the vitamin E is rubbed directly into the scar tissue and surrounding skin it basically loosens the high-tensile collagen fibers over time if applied daily, restoring the tissue's flexibility. We would just use a regular Vitamin E liquid capsule, puncture it, and rub the oil into the scar and all over the surrounding area. I would highly suggest buying a bottle of Vitamin E liquid capsules and rub the oil from the capsules into the area under his wing that is scarred and that tears open. Just doing this on a daily basis should stop the tearing in a matter of weeks if you apply the Vitamin E every day. And vitamin E is completely safe to use and there is no problem if he ingests it, unlike commercial lotions or ointments made for scar breakup, like Mederma.
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