Wet or loose Droppings (Diarrhoea)
I receive many e-mails and the bigger percent are new budgie owners and loose droppings in their new budgie.In their new homes cold and wrong feeding often cause loose droppings ,this can then let other diseases in.You can keep your budgie healthy if you have proper instruction on how to keep a budgie as a companion in the home.On placing the new companion in the cage YOU want to play with it.poke and prod it and constantly shout who's a bonny bird then,wham! we now have a nervous bird suffering stress and this is the reason for the loose droppings.Do not dose the bird with unknown medicines just keep it warm and in isolation with seed , millet spray and water on the cage floor.
You can get loose, wet droppings for all sorts of reasons:-
Too much wet, green food. (lettuce can often be a culprit if fed in large quantities). Give greenfoods every other day,just a little,give them greenfoods once a week and they will gorge themselves and then end up with loose droppings.
Wild foods that have maybe been contaminated with weed sprays, dogs droppings etc. I would never feed them wildfoods and risk my birds becoming ill,why not grow your own on the window sills at home.
Bacterial infection. (Salmonella etc.)
Food poisoning can be caused by spoiled food,spoiled greens or fouled water.The bacteria causing botulism will multiply to such an extent that if ingested the toxins produced bring serious illness and often death.If the birds wings droop,it is unable to fly and the legs become paralyzed death will almost happen.In a milder case a pinch of epsom salts dissolved in two tablespoons of water and given directly into the birds beak using a medicine dropper will help the bird recover.
Chills or colds (often during damp, wet, windy cold, weather) ,it's hot so we open the window but do not realise our budgie is sitting in a cross draught until it becomes ill,take care remember draughts kill birds.
Digestive upsets for multiple reasons including mouldy food ,always remove any softfoods,fruit or greens within six hours of feeding them to your birds.
Pregnant Hens (normal) Their droppings are copious, in quantity and loose. You will not believe the meaning of the word copious until you witness this.
Egg-bound Hen .See my complaints page.
Any toxins (irritants/poisons - inc. "poisonous" plants etc. including those that may be growing near enough to the Aviary, so that the bird has access through the mesh and they have disagreed with the birds' digestive system .If in doubt never give your birds new perches,leaves or plants until you can guarantee they are safe.
Chewing Aviary panels that may have something on them that disagrees with the bird. - Zinc poisoning ) Wash all your wire down using a paint brush and vinegar,this works.
Frosted Fruit or Veg. An easy one this do not feed it.
WORMS,cleanliness in you birdroom will keep worms away,if you suspect worms take the bird with sample droppings to the vets and a wormer will be supplied.
Diarrhoea is nature's way of ridding the body of something that the digestive system is not happy with.
The droppings can be lots of different colours, which can denote, in many cases, what has caused the diarrhoea. (If it's really bad and you are worried - consult an Avian Vet- Don't delay, as one days' illness in a bird is equal to 7 days in a human).
Remember birds won't show they are ill until they are really ill. It's their way of protecting themselves in the Wild, when predators would pick off any bird that looked different to the rest and other birds would pick on them.
The last thing you really want to use to treat diarrhoea are Anti-biotics, as the guts' natural Good Bacteria is already compromised and using Anti-B's kills off bacteria - both good and bad.
The best thing you can do if the bird appears unwell, as well as having loose droppings, is to keep it warm
- use a hospital Cage or improvise - see Barrie's propagator.
When a bird is off colour, for whatever reason, it feels cold, that's why it sits fluffed-up. The very act of sitting means it isn't keeping warm by flying around. It's usually off it's food too.
Once you have it in the hospital cage, make sure the atmosphere is not too dry, (have a shallow bowl of water in the cage) as the bird has lost body fluids in the diarrhoea, and will be prone to dehydration especially if the atmosphere is too dry and it's not eating or drinking.
On the hospital cage floor, use layers of paper which are easily rolled up and disposed of, as they get soiled or "Easibed" which will absorb the droppings, so that the bird is not paddling around or sitting in them.
Offer tempting foods (depending on the bird species) - nothing sloppy - no fruit/veg at the moment. Try EMP egg food, lightly dampened with boiled, drained sweetcorn. You can add a sprinkly of Electrolyte/Pro-biotic to this. Millet Sprays are taken by most birds and are easy to digest.
Putting a pro-biotic into the birds' drinking water (check the tub for quantities). This helps replace lost body fluids and essential sugars, salts & minerals that the body needs to survive. It's like an electrolyte that athletes use after sweating a lot, to replace the body's essential fluids, that have been sweated out. It also has the effects of Actimel, which replenishes the good bacteria in the digestive system.
The Good bacteria are necessary to digest the food that the bird eats. Bad Bacteria kill off the good bacteria and the food doesn't get digested properly and starts to ferment (then you get Hubble, bubble,boil and trouble syndrome in the guts!!) - hence the digestive upset.
You could also add a little glucose to the water which will help encourage the bird to sample the drink and will also act as a food source.
Encourage the bird to drink. If, and only if you are proficient in feeding a bird via a crop tube or feeding syringe, should you dissolve some pro-biotic in warm water and feed it straight into the birds' crop. If you are not proficient, please don't even try.
You could try and tempt the bird with some of the above solution off a bent funnel spoon. Don't tip it into the beak, let the bird take it very slowly, because if you force it into the beak then the bird could aspirate (i.e. choke because the fluid goes into the lungs instead of into the gullet and then down into the crop).
There is a very fine line for error when feeding the bird via the beak, as the bird has to physically to shut off the access to it's trachea (windpipe) when it's feeding and drinking. If it's stressed becos it's ill and/or you are trying to get it to take liquids then, in it's panic, it could breathe the liquid in or the "shutting-off" process doesn't happen. Either way the fluid could go into the lungs - or come out of the bird's nostrils. Neither of which is ever a good thing and can in some instances Kill the bird!!
If the bird has had digestive problems over a few days then squashy droppings can accumulate and clog the vent area. This can create it's own problems, as the bird then has difficulty in passing any more droppings, as the vent becomes blocked! This in itself can put a bird off eating, as it's digestive system becomes back-logged and has no outlet!
You must then catch the bird up and GENTLY soak the area with warm water (never hotter than your blood heat - test the temp on your wrist first - it must not feel hot or too cool). Use a wadge of cotton wool and keep irrigating the clotted mass of droppings until they are soft enough to remove - never force them off as you can rip the skin and feathers off the birds' vent area.
Once you have removed the droppings, thoroughly dry the vent area. Then apply vaseline, olive oil or anything you would put on a baby's bottom for nappy rash. This helps prevent droppings sticking in future and also soothes the area.
Keep the bird warm until it dries out.
It was 1959 when i realised a birds droppings and a cars spark plugs could tell us such a lot about the internal workings of car and bird,since that day 49 years ago i have always introduced dropping boards into the aviaries.I have a piece of ply under the perches that can be removed for regular cleaning,this collects the droppings and i can check daily if anything is requiring more attention.
Understanding your bird's droppings could save your bird's life.
It is true that when a bird becomes sick that their health can deteriorate quickly. But it's rarely true that when a bird become sick, it dies suddenly without showing symptoms of illness. The symptoms are there, we just have to learn how to recognize them.
Changes in the droppings can be a very early indicator that the bird is sick. Know what normal droppings look like so you can recognize a change in color, consistency, order, and/or amount. Use paper at the bottom of the cage so that the dropping falls flat and clean onto the paper. This will enable you to recognize any changes in color, consistency, order, and/or amount. If you are able to notice this change you could save your bird's life.
If you use wood shavings at the bottom of your cage and you miss a change in color and consistency in the droppings then you failed your bird. It is wrong to use wood shavings at the bottom of your cage so that it looks nice and you do not have to clean the bottom of your cage as often if it interferes with evaluating the droppings for signs of health problems.
There are three components to most droppings. Urine consists of a crystal urine called urates (white chalky material) and a non-crystal urine called urine (clear water). Sometimes the 2 types of urine are mixed, creating a cloudy white urine.
Important changes include color changes and amount.
Green or yellow urates = Liver Disease, Anorexia
Brown or chocolate urates = Lead Poisoning Red urine or urates
Red Urine or Urates = Internal bleeding
Increased urine = Disease, Eating food high in water, Drinking a lot
The third part of the droppings is the feces which comes from the colon and consists of digested food. The color varies depending on the types of food eaten. Red pellets and strawberries produce a red colored dropping. (This does not apply to the urine..) Seed and green vegetables produce a green dropping. (This does not apply to the urine.) Blueberries and blackberries produce black droppings. The feces should be solid and tubular like a worm. It can be coiled up or uncoiled and it is okay if it is broken into pieces.
Diarrhea is not excessive urine in the droppings. Diarrhea is the fecal material not holding its tubular shape. Instead it is the consistency of pudding. Look for blood in the feces. If the feces is fresh and black in color and there were no blueberries in the diet then this indicates melena. Melena is black droppings caused by bleeding high up in the digestive system. When the blood passes through the lower digestive system, it is digested, turning the red blood into a black tarry color, staining the feces black.
Color which cannot be explained by the diet should be investigated by your veterinarian. Don't forget to look for real worms like tapeworms and roundworms.
If you notice black droppings (indicating internal bleeding) at the bottom of your bird's cage, stop and go to your veterinarian. If you wait until the bird is weak, not eating, and fluffed up, then you have a race against the clock to save the bird's life.
Watch your bird's droppings everyday and learn what they look like normally. When you notice a change, identify what portion of the dropping has changed. If you cannot explain the change by the bird's lifestyle, then act immediately and contact your avian veterinarian.
Courtesy of Dr. David J. Kersting, D.V.M.