Feather plucking

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kathy b
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Joined: Tue May 06, 2008 11:00 am
Location: Kentucky

Feather plucking

Post by kathy b »

My ringneck is a male, 10 years old and has for the last 2 years pulled out all his feathers except his tail and wings. He has been tested by his vet and is healthy. He is happy and eats well. Does any one else have this problem or is there something I can do. I work out of my home and he is very spoiled, cable tv, out of his cage all the time, heated perch ect. PLEASE HELP!! Is this something I have to live with. :(
Bella
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Joined: Thu Jan 03, 2008 2:21 pm
Location: Staffordshire, England

Post by Bella »

I am part of anothert bird forum and there is a similar thing with a beautiful alexandrine and a very kind guy has taken him in for a while to try and stop him and has put him with one of his pluckers and with this bird and he is improving being with another bird. Maybe you could try a friend for him if its at all possible and you have tried all other things. Im guessing its not bordom if he is out of the cage all day so maybe a mate to play with through the day is the answer.
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tzigane
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Feather plucking stopped by a Birdy Buddy

Post by tzigane »

I have a cockatiel hen that started feather plucking under her wings about 6 years ago. I had tried EVERYTHING I could think of, in addition to many ideas I read about. Nothing seemed to work, so I gave up, thinking that it was just something that I was going to have to tolerate. My experience has shown me that if it's not medical...it's stress, plain & simple. BUT finding out the source of that stress is the HARD part! Although, after these few years, I had finally come to the conclusion that the stress was caused by her wanting to breed. The fact that another female was getting all of the attention was apparently causing her to be very anxious. You see, I've had to put her in a separate cage from my other 3 cockatiels because they all gang up on her and don't let her have a moment's peace. But, I did leave her cage next to ther other so she could still share their company.

Anyway, I decided to purchase a "birdy buddy" for her to snuggle against on cooler nights because she is getting older - she's about 12 now - and thought she might enjoy something snuggly. Well, wouldn't you know it...she STOPPED feather plucking. She just adores that thing. She chirps to it, snuggles up against it, preens it, and even gets mad at it when it doesn't accept her advances! It was a happy accident, but I'm glad after all this time to have discovered a solution to her anxiety issues. Here is a link to a picture of what I'm talking about: http://www.thatpetplace.com/pet/prod/21 ... 5JCDUxfQ__. If for some reason, this link doesn't work, simply do a search on the Internet for Birdy Buddy to see what it looks like.

Hope this helps!
tzigane
Donna
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Post by Donna »

My ringneck is a male, 10 years old and has for the last 2 years pulled out all his feathers except his tail and wings. He has been tested by his vet and is healthy. He is happy and eats well. Does any one else have this problem or is there something I can do. I work out of my home and he is very spoiled, cable tv, out of his cage all the time, heated perch ect. PLEASE HELP!! Is this something I have to live with.


There are many reasons birds pluck, stress, hormones, allergies are the big reasons. If you had him tested and he is not ill then I would say it's one of the above. There are things you could give him such as aloe baths and some red palm oil in his food to help his plucking, and a vitiman supplement wouldn't hurt either.

Donna
In Loving Memory
of one special husband and one special bird.

I miss you both
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