No rest for the wicked

Oh my goodness! Bless Velvet's little birdie heart.
Molting can certainly 'temporarily' change their appearance, that's for sure.

Fancyfeathers wrote:

What a wonderful update on Scarlet, Teresa.
You did a fabulous job of caring for her.

She looks great and don't you know she is ever so grateful for all the TLC you gave her.

I ditto all of that!! Made my morning!! ((((BIG HUGS Teresa)))))

Thank you, Cindy and Jenn!
I love it when they're well enough to go free, but I confess I really worry about them until I have proof that they're coping well and the flock has accepted them back.

I'm concerned about Velvet. He's more fluffed-up than he should be and poops are smelling again. I think he may need another course of Flagyl.
I wish there was an alternative to Flagyl, because by now the canker must have built some resistance to it, but apparently nothing else has been licenced in Portugal for canker treatment. I asked at an aquarium shop about Fish Zole but they neither have it nor know it.

Fishzole is the metronidazole...the same thing as flagyl. Can you get spartrix?

I'm sorry to hear Velvet appears to be feeling a bit under the weather again, Teresa.
I hope you are able to nip it quickly.

Matilda wrote:

Fishzole is the metronidazole...the same thing as flagyl. Can you get spartrix?

Nope. They even read all the suppliers' catalogues and lists of meds approved for use in Portugal and Spartrix isn't there. Then they looked for other substances used to combat flagellate infections, any alternatives to Metronidazole, and there was none licenced.
It'll have to be Flagyl again, I suppose.

I suppose it should be for this time. I can order some spartrix and send it to you if you'd like.

Matilda wrote:

I suppose it should be for this time. I can order some spartrix and send it to you if you'd like.

Yes, please! It would be great to have some on hand for the next emergency. Please let me know the cost of the Spartrix+postage and I'll send it through Paypal.

I've started Velvet on the Flagyl. Poor baby, I felt something wasn't right and I had the proof when I weighed him. He lost weight in the last week. So he's back on constant heat now and being hand-fed peas and corn. He protested at being hand-fed (he never did like it!) and immediately after... stargazing! There's the definite evidence, if we needed it.
But after eating, and drinking his tepid water with vitamins, and whilst still a warm and snug burrito, he relaxed and even fell asleep on my lap.

I can't get my head round these symptoms. What crazy kind of PMV-type virus suddenly takes a vicious turn for the worse at the precise time (about 6 weeks) that it should disappear? Could it be more than one type of virus?

Oh boy! Just as I was typing, Merry threw up half his dinner into his bowl of water! Thankfully, he doesn't appear to have thrown up the Baytril. Having cleaned up the odorous mess, I feel more than a bit queasy... I'll never know how you managed all this plus pukey-smelling seagull food when you already had morning sickness to contend with!!! :eek:

PM me your address.

Teresa wrote:

Matilda wrote:

I suppose it should be for this time. I can order some spartrix and send it to you if you'd like.

Yes, please! It would be great to have some on hand for the next emergency. Please let me know the cost of the Spartrix+postage and I'll send it through Paypal.

I've started Velvet on the Flagyl. Poor baby, I felt something wasn't right and I had the proof when I weighed him. He lost weight in the last week. So he's back on constant heat now and being hand-fed peas and corn. He protested at being hand-fed (he never did like it!) and immediately after... stargazing! There's the definite evidence, if we needed it.
But after eating, and drinking his tepid water with vitamins, and whilst still a warm and snug burrito, he relaxed and even fell asleep on my lap.

I can't get my head round these symptoms. What crazy kind of PMV-type virus suddenly takes a vicious turn for the worse at the precise time (about 6 weeks) that it should disappear? Could it be more than one type of virus?

Oh boy! Just as I was typing, Merry threw up half his dinner into his bowl of water! Thankfully, he doesn't appear to have thrown up the Baytril. Having cleaned up the odorous mess, I feel more than a bit queasy... I'll never know how you managed all this plus pukey-smelling seagull food when you already had morning sickness to contend with!!!

...It was really disgusting.

Teresa, if you want, contact this person
vitor1971silva@hotmail.com
His name is Vitor Silva (as you can guess) and he is racing pigeons in Portugal. Use my name (he ows me) and ask him where he gets Spartrix. I'll contact him too, but it is good for you to have his details for future use.

I'm so sorry to hear Merry doesn't seem to be doing much better, Teresa.
Will continue to think positive thoughts.

Please do keep us posted.

plamenh wrote:

Teresa, if you want, contact this person
vitor1971silva@hotmail.com
His name is Vitor Silva (as you can guess) and he is racing pigeons in Portugal. Use my name (he ows me) and ask him where he gets Spartrix. I'll contact him too, but it is good for you to have his details for future use.

That's great, Plamenh.
Pigeon Angels teamwork in action once again.

Teresa...........I am so sorry to hear that Velvet and Merry are not feeling well. You really do have your hands full there. I hope both birds will be on the road to recovery in no time at all.

Sendig you healing thoughts and prayers.

Louise

Major panic about Velvet

Okay, he's settled now and I've calmed down, but this morning I was horrified when I found all the peas and corn I'd fed him on the bottom of the tray.
Judging by their pristine condition, he must have vomited them -- or else somehow they passed through the gut without being digested at all.
The urates were a strange colour too and he was very frail and looked miserable.

I tube-fed him a very watery mixture of baby cereal with honey and a tiny pinch of salt, and when I wasn't tending to the others I had him with me all the time. He hasn't been sick, and at the moment he is awake, alert and not fluffed up. The perch in his cage was replaced by a heated nest. He's sitting in it and he's looking comfortable.

He's still taking the Flagyl. (By the way, Plamen, thank you so much for the contact for Spartrix, will act on it asap!)

His kidneys were already compromised by the PMV, and my fear was/is that other organs may be threatening to shut down. Any thoughts?

Oh my!
Do you think the liquid in the picture might be from Velvet vomiting? If so, I'm wondering if he's developing sour crop. Just a thought.
Do you detect any sour odor coming from his mouth?
I'm sure, given what you're dealing with with Merry, the last thing you want to smell is a sour odor coming from a pigeon's mouth.

I didn't detect any odour coming from his mouth, but just before I restarted him on Flagyl his poops were smelly -- that has stopped now.
He hasn't been sick since his last feeding. I wonder if it's possible the whole lot could have gone through the gut? Surely not...

PS. Though we cannot discount the possibility that some of that liquid might have been brought up, I'm sure most of it came off the other end, as he always stands facing left (facing his seed bowl).

Here's a picture of his tray taken on December 6th, for comparison:

Teresa, I am so sorry to hear about the problems with Velvet. My first reaction to what you have written about the symptoms and reactions of the bird is that it is potentially the antibiotics which made the PMV symptoms come back again.
Willy had a relapse too about 2 weeks ago where he started vomiting as well and I had to put him on baby food which worked very well.
I cannot really explain but I have the feeling that peas and corn are not really the best thing for PMV pigeons which suffer additionally from poor digestion. Pina has vomited a few peas several times and Willy as well. So I entirely stopped feeding those. I went back to the homemade pellets which I make now from:

grinding normal pigeon food - 1/3, a few sunflower hearts, adding polenta (the sweet corn stuff you make polenta from - 1/3 - it is more coarse than the flour) and grinded breadcrumbs for the binding also 1/3 - mix it all well with water, cinnamon tea or chamomille tea and form little pellets the size of peas. The pellets are best fed when made fresh or when dry - i dip them in hot water so that they are easily swallowed. This pellet mixture is easily softened when it gets wet - which means it is easily digested when in the crop of a pigeon.

All my 3 pigeons have not vomited once since I feed those and the poops are getting better.

Here is the source for the Spartrix where I ordered it from (it came very quickly):

http://vets4petz.nl/index.php or

Spartrix http://vets4petz.nl/spartrix-50t-p-289.html

Hope you can get it from there - in the Netherlands - if not let me know!!!!

Teresa...do you think the yellow liquid, in the first picture is vomit or urates? and...is it really yellow or just appears so in the picture?

Thank you for all the advice, Petra!

I checked up 'polenta', as I didn't know the term, and it's made from cornmeal. I can get that locally. I'm going to try your recipe and see how they like it! At first, I was a little concerned that the mix might not contain enough protein, but I have since found a new pigeon food with extra protein for the racing season, so I'll use that in the mix.

Thank you also for the Spartrix links. I'm going to contact the man Plamen mentioned frst, to see if there is a supplier in Portugal (in spite of what the pharmacists say), but if not I'll try that!

I agree with you that antibiotics and PMV don't mix well. However, in this case, the stargazing and the weight loss happened before he took the Flagyl, so I'm still puzzled. Today's events may be related to it, though, and it was a hard choice to make to put him on Flagyl in his condition -- unfortunately I have seen too many pigeons die of untreated canker (or treated too late) and I couldn't bear to lose Velvet.

Matilda wrote:

Teresa...do you think the yellow liquid, in the first picture is vomit or urates? and...is it really yellow or just appears so in the picture?

It's definitely urates, but I don't know if there's any vomit in with it. And yes, it's yellow.

I do know that yellow is an indication of infection that is affecting the liver.

Rarely does a feral come to us with just one thing, such as just PMV ... just canker...just salmonella...just worms...etc. It's liike pealing away the layers, getting one thing under control only to have yet another emerge and after that...another still. It can be so frustrating and I see it over and over.
Recently my dear Sammy started vomiting and he had nasty looking poop with yellow urates...because he is my beloved, I had no perspective ... I had a culture done. It took several days but came back yeast infection. E-coli also grew in the culture but was determined to be within the normal range and I did not treat him for that. He was treated for 7 days with nystatin 2 times a day and within 24 hours he was much better, the vomiting stopped and he was eating on his own.

Oh my, poor Sammy! Hope he's alright now!

The yellow urates were just today. Do you suppose the Flagyl caused it? Not sure whether to stop giving it to him or not.
I could take him to the vets tomorrow, but with the weekend looming they may only do a culture next week, and then there's the wait... I've got Nystatin. If only we were sure...

I took some more pictures just now, and the liquid is more greenish than it was this morning. (Maybe because he wasn't fed corn?)

Here I put two bits of paper in the tray, one white and one yellow, for colour control. You can see the solid urates are definitely off-colour.



And here I poured some of the liquid onto a white piece of paper to show its colour:

My Sammy is great now. I can't begin to tell you how much I love him but I know you understand.

Teresa...the nystatin won't hurt. The dosage I have for pigeons is 0.3ml, 2 times a day.
Initially, when Sammy's poop was examined, there was a lot of yeast in it and because he was so sick, it was sent off to be cultured and so I didn't wait all those days to treat him but started nystatin right away.
Telling you this doesn't mean Velvet has a yeast infection...it could be so many things, but it could. Before you take poop to be cultured, let the vet know he is on flagyl because that could affect the out come. It does take several days to get a culture back because it needs time to grow.