LOOK WHAT I FOUND ON TOP OF MY AVIARY!

Jay - I am sorry that your bird is still sick! Your link exactly said what I knew from other infos about honey - not everyting "natural" is always good.

When the crop is not emptying properly and a yeast infection might be the cause I would not feed anything that contains sugar or honey because sugar feeds yeast. Have you considered the possibility to give him probiotic joghurt? The good bacteria in plain yoghurt helps to fight yeast as well as any problem the bird may have with digestion.

While my pigeons were sick with PMV and had severe problems with digesting solid food I always added joghurt to the mixture - just a teaspoon full for about 50 ml liquid food.
Please be sure that the joghurt is not sweetened with anything. Plain rice flakes for babies and joghurt might help here. Depending on how the bird is improving I would add less and less water then. Don't be worried when the poops are rather fluid - they become solid after a while again.

Sending healing thoughts for your little one

it seems the cause may be a large flat seed, such as a pumpkin seed, that is keeping the crop from emptying. I'm anxious to find out how the bird is doing today.

This is a pretty amazing update, but here goes.
Last Friday when I took Jasper to the vet, I told her that I thought it might be a blockage. She said that it wasn't. When I asked her how she could be sure, she said "because I don't feel anything. Any large clumps or anything." So we came home with medicines......................which weren't working. It was weird to me how just so much was coming through, and intermitantly. I just had a gut feeling that it WAS a blockage.

So, last night, I suctioned out his crop so that I could try and feel what was in there. And I felt seeds, of course, but I just knew there was something else in there. I kept manipulating the crop, and then BINGO! I felt what felt to me like a piece of wood. It was flat on one side, but actually felt thicker than a flat seed or something, but I had no idea of what it was. Why would he eat wood? But at least now, I could go back to the vet and tell her what I had found.

At the vets, she again suctioned out his crop, which has to be soooo sore by now, and she started feeling for what ever it was that I had felt. All of a sudden, she felt it. So they took him to surgery right away. She said it was a risk putting him under, as he was so debilitated, but that he really had no other choice. He weighed 210 grams when I found him last Tuesday evening, and today he weighed only 188 grams. He doesn't have the same fight in him, and he isn't really warm to the touch. I'm really worried about the poor little thing. But I figured we had to try, and if the anesthesia took him, then it was better than suffering and wasting away. This has been so draining on the both of us. Funny how attached one can get in a weeks time, to a fiesty little pigeon who hates you. But attached I am of course.

Anyway, after the surgery, Alyssa asked if I would mind if she took him home tonight, because she doesn't work tomorrow, and she wanted to keep a close eye on him, and keep him hydrated and all. And she doesn't like leaving birds at the hospital over night, as no one will be there. I know she's worried too. She will be back to work on Wednesday, but will call me tomorrow with an update. Now what she found was horrifying, as she brought the contents of his crop in to show me. I am still just stunned. And I am so praying that he makes it. That he just hangs on a while longer, to have time to heal. This is what was in Jaspers crop. The penny is just for comparison.



So, if ever you have the gut feeling that there is a blockage, stay with the liquids or applesauce. Defrosted peas are normally great, but with a blockage, they just sat in there and rotted. Next time, I will push it, if I think something other than what the vet thinks. I will push for further exploration.

And this was just what she got out, we have no way of knowing if it went into the intestine, or the gizzard. Or just how cut up his little crop might be. Was he so hungry that he ate glass, or did someone purposely mix glass in with bird seed to kill the pigeons. If they did, then how cruel was that? Who would do such a thing to a little innocent bird. What a horrible way to die. At least, if any more show up in my yard that seem sick with starvation poops, I'll know where to start.

Oh My Goodness. That is just amazing.

Poor little Jasper I'm so glad you followed your intuition Jay.

I think the worst is over and now he can start on the road to recovery.

Sending healing thoughts and prayers.


Louise

Thanks. I think he needs all the healing thoughts and prayers he can get.
I miss him being here. But he's probably in the best place he can be for now. It's hard looking at him so sore and sad. Hope she got it all.

I'm so sorry to hear about Jasper, Jay.
I'm sure he feels much better. He may be sore from the surgery but he has to be feeling better with a cleaned out crop.

Bless you both.

This is really awful. Hopefully these particles were too big to slip further down into his intestines. If I imagine someone would have done this deliberately I would

I really hope for your little Jasper that he continues to fight and that all the wounds that must be in his crop are healing. Sending more healing thoughts for your little one

Thanks guys. I just hope it isn't too late. I wish the surgery had been done last Friday when I first saw the vet. This is days later, and he has just lost so much weight and gotten so much weaker. But he did make it through the surgery, and that is something. I will be on pins and needles, waiting for her to call. Poor little one is between a rock and a hard place. I know his crop needs to rest, but his poor little body needs nutrition. I'll update after I speak with her this afternoon. Again, thanks.

NiteOwl wrote:

Thanks guys. I just hope it isn't too late. I wish the surgery had been done last Friday when I first saw the vet. This is days later, and he has just lost so much weight and gotten so much weaker.
* But he did make it through the surgery, and that is something.

** I will be on pins and needles, waiting for her to call.

Poor little one is between a rock and a hard place. I know his crop needs to rest, but his poor little body needs nutrition. I'll update after I speak with her this afternoon. Again, thanks.

* You're exactly right.

** .
And as we wait for an update, the positive thoughts will be in overdrive.

I just had an email from Jay. She wanted me to let you all know that Jasper is out of pain...he passed on and is flying with the angels now....he was just too weak to hang on.
Understandably, Jay is exhausted and heartbroken and is going to try and get some rest.

I'm so very, very sorry Jay


FLY FREE AND HIGH PRECIOUS LITTLE JASPER



Louise

I am so sorry, Jay.

Jay - I am really very very sorry for little Jasper and for you. You tried everything. But sometimes it is just not meant to work. I am very sorry

Thanks guys. I'm sorry, but I just couldn't post about it yesterday. I only had Jasper for one week, but it doesn't take me long to get attached, and I wanted so much for this little one to live, and enjoy his life. I know I have to except that sometimes that just doesn't happen, but it's hard. The vet felt badly, because if the surgery had been done on Friday, Jaspers chances for recovery would have been much higher. But on Friday, she didn't feel that there was a blockage. I did. So she did the surgery and took him home with her, and she said that they had quite a night, as she was really trying for him. I could tell how badly she felt when she called me. She also thanked me for bringing him in, as she felt that most people wouldn't have bothered. She cares about all animals whether feral or not. I like that about her. She also likes me coming in, as it is helping her to learn more about pigeons in particular, as she doesn't normally have the opportunity to deal with them. And she is very open to learning. I told her that she would be learning LOTS about them. She even cut the bill in half, and told me to keep it and put it toward the next little rescue that came along. She is a great resource for this area. And I got her name a while back from Charis' list. She has been wonderful with my birds.

That was very kind of the vet to take him home with her and then to also cut the bill in half. You are lucky to have found her. She sounds very kind.
I'm so sorry he didn't make it. More than naught...life just doesn't seem just.

Jasper would have been part of the flock that comes to my yard. I don't know how he got to eating glass, but does anyone find it strange that I had like 40 pigeons coming daily, and for the last couple of days, only about 20. Yesterday 19 and today 21. This is unusual. I have no idea when they started dropping off in numbers, as I have just been too busy to notice, what with work, Jasper, vet visits, and my own loft to keep up. But for the past couple of days, I have noticed. Any ideas?

Maybe the hawks are migrating through.

Well they never stopped coming, or begin to stop coming until during the winter time. And that has been for the past two years. Hawks have never sent them away this early before.

Do you know where the flock hang out after they feed?

They were going to Millville, the next town over, where they used to roost in an old tower, until this past summer when they netted it off. Then I think the person I spoke with said they were roosting on the town hall or post office or something, and they closed off parts of that. Anyway, they have been trying to get rid of them.

I don't know then. Maybe they have found a place that is more friendly than Melville.