Post by Minna on Apr 13, 2008 9:19:31 GMT 10
I haven't been around in a while -started a new job, and haven't had a lot of time. It's all sort of settling down now, so hopefully I'll be around more.
But while working, I did a terrible thing -I fell out of the habit of weighing my babies.
Last Sunday morning, when I went and uncovered the babuts, Akira was asleep in the seed bowl. They hadn't gotten any seed in a few weeks, so I put in a bowl with some early the day before -just enough to cover the bottom. She had spent the whole day there, head down, searching through, picking on Caspian if he got too close, so I didn't think much of it, just assumed she was being protective of it, because she's been known to do that.
I got myself a gardening glove, tipped her out of it (to much birdie scolding), changed their food and water and I was still recovering from a flu that had lain me out for about ten days, so I went and slept for a few hours. Came back and Akira was sitting up on her usual perch with Caspian, biting very savagely when I tried to get her out.
This is something she does sometimes, as well. 90% of the time she's a sweetheart, but sometimes she'll get into a hormonally inspired mood for a couple of days.
Joel went into their room a couple of hours later and called me, saying he didn't think Akira looked terribly good.
She was sitting on the bottom of the cage, fluffed up. While I watched she dragged herself up to the water bowl, and ended up with water all down her front because she half fell into it. When I put my hand in she tried to grab my finger with her foot, but stumbled. I was standing in front of a vet less than half an hour later at an emergency surgery. Unsurprisingly, they didn't have any avian vets, but the guy there suspected an infection, gave me a glucose solution to hand feed to her in case she wasn't getting enough energy for herself and some antibiotics.
She weighed in at 41 grams.
She's usually 50.
I spent the rest of the day getting at least a gram of glucose solution into her every hour until finally setting her up in one of the small cages with a blanket and Caspian on the bottom for her to sleep in, and took her into the BBV the next morning.
Her abdomen was swollen, and causing her pain. They gave her some painkillers and handfed her because she was showing interest in food, but not eating enough on her own.
While I was there, she went from sleepy and miserable and hiding in my shirt to suddenly quite active, running up and down the desk, jumping on the keyboard, chirping a sweet little hello at the girl who was in the room on some sort of work experience, and trying to clamber up and down all over everything.
We suspected megabacteria or a reproductive problem. Blood test came back with high liver, kidney and muscle enzymes because they were being broken down for energy. She had 50% of the red blood cell count that she should have had. Fecal tests consistently came back clean, but there was blood in them now. We started her on hormonal treatment in case it was in fact reproductive, but were still suspicious of some sort of infection because she'd started an odd little hitching behaviour that looked like she was attempting to vomit from her stomach to her crop.
In the meantime, Caspian was losing it. He spent eight solid hours constantly contact-calling, and then toned it down to ten or fifteen minutes once every hour or two. We ended up taking him in to stay with Akira on Tuesday night.
She died during the night.
An autopsy revealed a piece of metallic material. Nobody can figure out exactly what it is. It's hooked into almost a C shape, and it's too thick to be part of a bent nail. It got most of the way through her body safely before punching its way through her tiny body and bleeding her out. She was, I think, about thirteen months old. I've got no idea what it was, or where she could have picked up something like that, and she'd never, ever been the sort to shove random things in her mouth. Caspian, yes, but never her.
Caspian's dealing a lot better now than he was after she disappeared to the vet on Monday. I think it's because he was with her when she died, so he knows what happened and that she's not just hiding out in a different room in the house or something.
She lost ten grams without me even noticing. Even after realising she'd lost 20% of her body weight, I couldn't see any difference, and could barely feel it. While she was very friendly and affectionate, it wasn't a cuddly sort of affection, not since she was a tiny baby. In this particular situation, catching it earlier probably wouldn't have helped. But then again, it might have.
I couldn't bring her home, because we have nowhere to bury her.
Despite having another lovebird, she still wanted to come talk to me and would occasionally reject his company completely for the opportunity go sit and chatter on the shoulder of someone she hadn't seen in a few days. She never stopped being interested in and friendly to strangers. If she hadn't come out in a day or two, she'd throw herself to stand on the side of the cage closest to us whenever we appeared in the room and scold us. Lately she was letting us put our hands in the cages again without any drama at all, and her nesty moods were further apart and less severe.
She was an incredible little baby, and I miss her.
But while working, I did a terrible thing -I fell out of the habit of weighing my babies.
Last Sunday morning, when I went and uncovered the babuts, Akira was asleep in the seed bowl. They hadn't gotten any seed in a few weeks, so I put in a bowl with some early the day before -just enough to cover the bottom. She had spent the whole day there, head down, searching through, picking on Caspian if he got too close, so I didn't think much of it, just assumed she was being protective of it, because she's been known to do that.
I got myself a gardening glove, tipped her out of it (to much birdie scolding), changed their food and water and I was still recovering from a flu that had lain me out for about ten days, so I went and slept for a few hours. Came back and Akira was sitting up on her usual perch with Caspian, biting very savagely when I tried to get her out.
This is something she does sometimes, as well. 90% of the time she's a sweetheart, but sometimes she'll get into a hormonally inspired mood for a couple of days.
Joel went into their room a couple of hours later and called me, saying he didn't think Akira looked terribly good.
She was sitting on the bottom of the cage, fluffed up. While I watched she dragged herself up to the water bowl, and ended up with water all down her front because she half fell into it. When I put my hand in she tried to grab my finger with her foot, but stumbled. I was standing in front of a vet less than half an hour later at an emergency surgery. Unsurprisingly, they didn't have any avian vets, but the guy there suspected an infection, gave me a glucose solution to hand feed to her in case she wasn't getting enough energy for herself and some antibiotics.
She weighed in at 41 grams.
She's usually 50.
I spent the rest of the day getting at least a gram of glucose solution into her every hour until finally setting her up in one of the small cages with a blanket and Caspian on the bottom for her to sleep in, and took her into the BBV the next morning.
Her abdomen was swollen, and causing her pain. They gave her some painkillers and handfed her because she was showing interest in food, but not eating enough on her own.
While I was there, she went from sleepy and miserable and hiding in my shirt to suddenly quite active, running up and down the desk, jumping on the keyboard, chirping a sweet little hello at the girl who was in the room on some sort of work experience, and trying to clamber up and down all over everything.
We suspected megabacteria or a reproductive problem. Blood test came back with high liver, kidney and muscle enzymes because they were being broken down for energy. She had 50% of the red blood cell count that she should have had. Fecal tests consistently came back clean, but there was blood in them now. We started her on hormonal treatment in case it was in fact reproductive, but were still suspicious of some sort of infection because she'd started an odd little hitching behaviour that looked like she was attempting to vomit from her stomach to her crop.
In the meantime, Caspian was losing it. He spent eight solid hours constantly contact-calling, and then toned it down to ten or fifteen minutes once every hour or two. We ended up taking him in to stay with Akira on Tuesday night.
She died during the night.
An autopsy revealed a piece of metallic material. Nobody can figure out exactly what it is. It's hooked into almost a C shape, and it's too thick to be part of a bent nail. It got most of the way through her body safely before punching its way through her tiny body and bleeding her out. She was, I think, about thirteen months old. I've got no idea what it was, or where she could have picked up something like that, and she'd never, ever been the sort to shove random things in her mouth. Caspian, yes, but never her.
Caspian's dealing a lot better now than he was after she disappeared to the vet on Monday. I think it's because he was with her when she died, so he knows what happened and that she's not just hiding out in a different room in the house or something.
She lost ten grams without me even noticing. Even after realising she'd lost 20% of her body weight, I couldn't see any difference, and could barely feel it. While she was very friendly and affectionate, it wasn't a cuddly sort of affection, not since she was a tiny baby. In this particular situation, catching it earlier probably wouldn't have helped. But then again, it might have.
I couldn't bring her home, because we have nowhere to bury her.
Despite having another lovebird, she still wanted to come talk to me and would occasionally reject his company completely for the opportunity go sit and chatter on the shoulder of someone she hadn't seen in a few days. She never stopped being interested in and friendly to strangers. If she hadn't come out in a day or two, she'd throw herself to stand on the side of the cage closest to us whenever we appeared in the room and scold us. Lately she was letting us put our hands in the cages again without any drama at all, and her nesty moods were further apart and less severe.
She was an incredible little baby, and I miss her.
