Thanks for the updates Chrissie, you are doing a great job with Percy. It seems like this vet was alot more thorough than your previous ones.. I'm crossing my fingers for you as well. Take care and keep on doing what your doing. Its fantastic to see someone putting in this much effort for their pet... if only all pet owners were like you.

Thanks so much for the update. It seems like your new vet is much better. Give my love to Percy and I hope all goes well with the test results! (((hugs))) Maesie xxx

Thanks so much for the update. It seems like your new vet is much better. Give my love to Percy and I hope all goes well with the test results! (((hugs))) Maesie xxx

 

 

Thanks maesie, just waiting for the results to come through this week now... and hoping they aren't going to be bad. Percy was a little brighter at times yesterday but is still up and down. His poo's still have the green stain around them so I wonder if the antibiotics are working. The poo's aren't normal either, sometimes like jelly and grey or white or sometimes just "water"... he's always been the same though and a worry. I will see how it goes but when he's bright it's just such a joy to see him near to being normal..... if only we could sort the gut problem out.

 

Chrissie x

Hi Chrissie,

 

after all that you and Percy have been through together I am sure that iti wil be nice to finally have some answers. It certainly sounds like this vet is more 'on the ball'.

 

*hugz to you and Percy*

 

 

Feathers.

Thanks for the updates Chrissie, I have been worried about Percy. The new vet sounds like she knows what she's doing, I am glad she is being thorough with the tests. Please keep us posted.

 

I can still give you a brief rundown of what I found, but I'm not sure how it helps right now.

 

Staphylococcus

It is commonly isolated from skin or mucosa of respiratory/digestive tract of birds that do not show signs.

Clinical signs associated with Staph: arthritis, osteomyelitis, osteitis. Septicaemia often causes nonspecific signs such as lethargy, anorexia, flexed spine, ruffled feathers. Digits may be swollen, congested an painful, many affected birds show lameness.

 

Streptococcus

Considered to part of the normal flora of the skin and mucosa of digestive, respiratory and reproductive tracts. Often become disease-inducing agents when host defenses are down. The chronic form of disease typically causes inflammation of the joints. Birds can develop cardiac problems, which are difficult to diagnose and often causes breathing difficulty.

 

Again, that bacterial isolation confuses me because it can be normal, and usually only overgrows when something else shows up. Your vet has done the right thing with the tests. Good luck! Fingers crossed the tests tell you straight up what's going on.

Edited March 17, 200817 yr by Chrysocome

Great to here that Percy is doing okay.

UPDATE:

 

Hi everyone,

 

The new vet rang last night and gave me the blood test result. She said that Percy's liver disease is due to a seed only diet (well apart from the veg n fruit we give him) and that we have to change him over to a completely all pellet diet so that his problems can be helped.

 

The Staph and Strep in the gut is apparently due to his diet too, the liver problem adding to it. I have to give him daily probiotics now, sprinkled on his food and not in the water, I will have to get some Avipro plus as the local vet gave me some capsules and I just can't get on with sprinkling only a quarter of them over his food.

 

The green water staining around his poo's is due to the liver (which I knew anyway) and that even if his liver recovers, that might not change.

 

She is concerned about the leg problem (he draws his right leg up) which she said could be a testicular tumour. They would have to do a barium x-ray to find this out but we know that there's nothing can be done if he does have this. She said to check his other foot to see if that okay and not red because of the strain on that. She also said that we might have to pad his perches to give him so comfort (how do we do that though... I'm not sure what I'd use?).

 

I would really like your comments on the above, I'm sure that Percy has a tendency to liver problems and it's not just been the diet because when we first had him at 6 weeks old, his poo's were not right and have always stayed the same.

 

Has anyone managed to get a bird off a seed diet onto pellets and do they really enjoy the pellets? I so much want to help Percy and alleviate the problems and whilst I know it will be difficult, I know something has got to be done.

 

I don't have to take him back to see the vet unless he gets worse in himself. I am resigned to things being not a lot better for him now and that the possible testicular cancer will be hard to cope with, but he is my world this little chap so I have to do as much as I possibly can.

 

Sorry this is a long post, please feel free to ask questions if you think I've omitted anything. If anyone has had similar problems re the liver/diet can you please help me through this? Sorry to have taken up so much of everyone's time but I really am grateful for all the help and caring support you have given me. Thank you SO much.

 

hugs

Chrissie x

You don't have to apologise to the people reading this that you are taking there time We all love budgies, and whilst I haven't been able to give you any information regarding your budgie I am sure that everyone that has did so because they wanted to help, not because they felt like they had to.

 

You are going through an exceptionally hard time and we are all happy to be here for you to voice your concerns/questions. As you've found out there are many people with a vast amount of information on here, they share this information because they are genuine caring people.

 

I really hope he doesn't have a tumor but if he does I am sure that you will look after him better than anyone else could. Just remember if you get stumped never feel like you can't ask or that you are imposing yourself on us, I have found with all my questions about budgies there is always someone that jumps in and answers it. The people here are what makes these forums such a great place to come and talk about budgies :hap:

I am very glad you have posted to fill us in on Percy. At least you have news and a direction to work towards. I am not a believer in pellets myself personally as I am a "natural is best" kind of girl. Mind you ...I do not buy off the supermarket shelf seed nor do I stick to a simple diet for the birds. My birds get the best of everything including natural bush remedies and branches etc. I do understand though that some birds will have these issues regardless of what seems to be correct diet.

I only wish you all the best in Percy's ongoing treatment and biggest hugs for your love and support to him and your endurance in keeping him going. Keep posting. Others will be along to help you work out the seed to pellet transition.

Cheers Kaz :angel1:

Chrissie, thanks for updates. I'm sorry to hear about the liver disease and associated problems, and the possible tumour.

I wish I could see what the bloods actually said. Did you get results from the biopsy too?

 

On diet - you may have read somewhere that my budgies got pretty overweight. I don't feed my birds pellets either, not that I am against them, I just think there is a better way. Have you tried feeding them a good variety of different dark green and orange vegetables? Maybe a supplement in the water? Then also more exercise time (I assume this is a fatty liver problem since you mentioned lipomas and fatty lumps). I personally don't like the sound of an all-pellet diet, I would advise to continue with seed and lots of veggies as well as pellets. But perhaps somebody who advocates switching to pellets can tell you more about that. I just found a nice list of vitamins and the different foods that have a lot of it - I wonder if I can look this up and post it somewhere without plagiarising.

 

Staph and Strep being secondary makes much more sense to me than the previous vet saying it was a main cause.

She is right to be worried about testicular tumour, which occurs rather frequently in budgies. An X-ray is the way to go there. But there are a few other causes of leg problems as well. I believe in Occam's razor though, that one cause is more likely than two, and two more likely than three. I wonder if the leg problem is related to the bacteria. That is just my musing, don't take my word for it. I'm not certain either about padding perches, but I'm sure another member here can tell you about it.

 

Diet is definitely a major factor in liver disease, so even if that wasn't the original cause it should help a lot. It is possible that Percy had a poor diet before you got him and his liver had already been pretty impaired already. Staph and Strep are also associated with hepatitis, and you are treating him for this too. All of it is helping.

 

Lastly I must applaud you for being so devoted and caring to your budgie, it is always a pleasure to meet a person like you. We are all here because we are mad about budgies and are more than willing to help you in this time of need. The others are right - please keep posting and talk to us whenever you need to, as we all understand what you are going through. Big hugs. Again I wish you and Percy the best.

Hi Jimmy, Kaz and Chrysocome,

Thank you all for the posts, I take great comfort in what you are saying, thank you for that. I must admit I too don't like the idea of an all pellet diet I really don't, although if it will help him I am going to persevere but I think it will be with occasional seed... At least he is trying the pellets and that's a good sign, he hasn't turned his beak up altogether at them... phew.

 

I forget to mention that she also said to give him 1 - 2 drops of milk thistle every day which I know does give help to the liver, so I have to get some of that.

 

I too am not sure about the leg problem, with the amount of bacteria he has in him (according the the local avian vet who I am trying not to go back to) then I think anything could be possible. The result from the biopsy wasn't back but the vet said she took cells rather than a biopsy (trust me to get it wrong) and thinks it was fat more than anything but would let me know if it was anything else. She also said if Percy picks up and we think he's up to it, sometime in the future he could have the x-ray, though I don't want to put him through too much as you may imagine. In his six short years he has been through *** really, considering how small a creature bugies are, this one has had more than his fair share of problems and procedures and I would love to "leave him to it" and not put him through more, but we shall have to see as the time goes on.

 

Percy is still up and down, but at least he's not always down or else that would be very worrying. I am going to have to look up the foods that he can have, esp veg and fruit. I give him brocolli once a week and carrots but he does like them cooked and mashed up. He doesn't eat a lot of fruit even when I hand feed him, though he does like a little banana AND ORANGE!! Didn't know they liked oranges. When nectarines come in I shall give him those as he likes them. I will definitely look for everything I can to help him and hopefully... and not too long ahead he will become well again.... that's my aim.

 

I'll still post if you don't get sick of me doing it <smile>.... but meanwhile thank you ALL so much for your invaluable help and kindness during this very stressful time. I can't thank you enough.

 

hugs

Chrissie xx

Hi Chrissie,

 

Thanks for the updates. Don't apoligise for the length of them. We are here to help you. I'm glad you got some answers from the tests. Best of luck and I'm praying for him! Keep us updated and we are all here for you both!

 

Hugs Maesie xoxo

Thank you for the update...pellets are hard to get them to eat. You can smash them up sprinkle them on his veggies, over the seed different things. I know it was very hard to get Merlin to eat pellets in fact we are still working on it.

It's good to hear you have found a vet that is helping Percy. I've birds with liver issues too, so understand what you are going through.

 

Mine eat Harrison's Mash as the pellet portion of their diet. It comes in different sizes, but they do not like even the SuperFine which is very small. They took to the Mash very quickly (although it was just a pellet size switch, they really like the Mash and will eat it before seeds now). I think your vet wants an all-pellet diet for the vitamins and minerals, as Percy is certainly deficient from eating just seeds. Personally I don't agree, there have been issues with budgerigars fed only-pellets, but short term it would get vitamins into Percy. I think if you fed seeds soaked, it would be helpful because they are very nutritious that way. My birds get milk thistle in a dried herb mix which I add to their dry food daily. It is not prescribed, but I prefer a holistic approach for my birds and think it probably helps in some way. They eat it fine, which is nice because they would vomit up the milk thistle I tried to give orally so cannot give in that form. I think if Percy had aspirated his meds, it would have been immediately apparent at the vets. Since you didn't notice the breathing issues until you got home, and he vomited up some seeds, it sounds like either it was stress-related or he does not tolerate that medicine. There are some meds I cannot give some of my birds orally because it makes them vomit shortly afterwards.

 

The lameness in one leg is troubling, as that is how it was discovered Rainbow had a kidney tumor. Hopefully Percy's lameness is not caused by a tumor, but if that is the case, there are cage modifications you can make so he can still get around and keep the good leg from developing problems with standing on it all the time.

 

Please keep us posted about Percy. You have always taken the best of care of him and he is a dear.

Hi Everyone

 

No I haven't forgotten you, I've been so busy lately, the computer has problems and I'm trying my best to sort that out... seems never ending.. sigh.

 

Just to let you know that Percy seems better in himself, but still is fluffed up occasionally, usually evenings and it's his gut problem. I have a theory that he is SO much better in the mornings when he hasn't eaten but as the day goes on and he eats.. the gut is misbehaving. He is very lively most mornings so it's a joy to see. Updates on food etc. He only occasionally eats the pellets, out of choice but when I take his seed away he looks for it and won't eat the pellets instead... so I put the seed back, he has that then later will eat the pellets on top of his cage... it's progress I think. I put the probiotics on his food every other day... and feed him what I can with fresh veg and fruit. He has the white of hard boiled egg occasionally too and I am hoping to do him some mung beans as in sprouts. Does anyone do them for their birds, if so how do you do them please? I am still waiting for the milk thistle to come so can't tell you about that here.

 

As for him standing on one leg like he did... it's very strange, since he's been better I've not seen him do it... I can't think why it happened, perhaps when his energy is down it happens then I don't know. I will of course watch for that again.

 

What I see now is that he is back to being okay-ish before he had the moult, the poo's are still as they were, grey, white, water etc etc.... green staining on the paper around them..... he's not moulting, he is lively when his gut isn't playing up... all this has gone on for the 6 yrs we've had him.... just wish I could do more for his gut problem.... it really goes down when he's in a moult.

 

Anyway, thank you all so much for bearing with me and for your kind, caring words. I don't know what I would do without this wonderful forum and all the lovely people on here.

 

hugs to you all

Chrissie xxx

Thanks Chrissie, I was wondering how you and Percy were getting on. I'm glad he is back to HIS normal self... although not 100%. If there was only a solution to help his tummy!!! Poor guy. I'll keep sending you my thoughts and prayers that he continues getting better. I feed my birds pasta and lentils (with their vegies), which they seem to like. The lentils I cook in simmering water as per the packet... I think it's an hour and a half? I then freeze them so I've always got some on hand. Keep us updated on your precious little boy. Hugs Maesie xxx

Thanks for the update. I am so pleased he is feeling a bit better. He is such strong little guy

Edited April 6, 200817 yr by **Liv**

This is great news glad everything is working out ....