5 Signs Your Bird is Sick

Jessi shares 5 ways to tell if your bird might be sick. Featuring lots of the birds at Animal Wonders (that aren't sick, just happy to join in the fun of the day)

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[TommyEfreeti]

Because it should be written somewhere, too!:

1. Weight Loss (loss of ~10% of morning weight is significant)
2. Droppings Composition (Solid Green Fecal Matter, White Uric Acid, Excess Clear liquid is healthy/normal; black, bright green or red are significant)
3. Breathing (Consistent, quiet is healthy. Wheezing or whistling are significant. Tails going up and down with each breath is a sign of labored breathing.)
4. Plumage (Bright and sleek is healthy. Dark lines indicate malnutrition. Plucking or bare patches indicate ill health.)
5. Change in Personality.

Never "wait and see"!

[thunderbuddy]

unfortunately I lost my conure. people always told us don't get a bird they are loud and they are messy and can become crazy from captivity. I think the real problem was those people didn't know how to care for one and give it the proper care.

so when I got birdie (yes his name is birdie, don't judge) I took a lot of time to learn as much as I could. it was amazing how good he was.

he chirped during the day of coarse but wasn't annoying in fact we had conversations. obviously he wasn't gonna understand them entirely but I truly believed he understood. somethings by the way he acted towards ways I expressed things.

he always went to bed at 11pm sharp but on one condition. he never liked being in his cage and it was a a little larger than he required but still good for him. he had to be outside of the cage under the towl.

we made sure since he never liked being in his cage to make sure any of his surroundings could not be hazardous. nothing he could naw on and get sick. made sure the heat was good.

we spent so much time with him and gave him the proper nutrition and everything.

but one day a window was open without even knowing it our poor little guy must has caught something from the cold and died.

just take this in mind when getting one of these beautiful animals to be apart of your family.

they are fragile and require care. the simplest thing can be trouble and don't make the mistake of not bringing them to the vet. because that is our biggest problem. I wanted to but others in my family didn't feel the need to.

don't make that mistake I regret it everyday. but always know I had the best of times with him.

[Nogardarret]

im a chicken owner and i want to point out one thing that may not be obvious, that chickens have very different poops from parrots and other birds. ideally, chickens poop should be a blackish-brownish lump with white portions or whitish liquid. sometimes, they will also secrete very very stinky poops that can be tan-black and are very smooth, usually they will do two of these in a row. this is normal, its an emptying of special tubes on their digestive tract called ceca, which use bacteria to further break down food. it is also normal to find small pebbles and pieces of rounded glass in your chickens poop. they swallow these to grind their food in their gizzard. still look out for consistently soupy poops or bloody ones, though!

[infininoodle]

6. Your bird is doing kick flips and riding a tiny skateboard.

[voyagerabove]

I was half-awake when I started watching this and heard the number 35 and the word career. My brain somehow put that together as "35 years career" and I spat my coffee out all over my monitor.

I need more coffee now.

[Roll]

I'm babysitting my neighbors parrot this week. Perfect timing for the video! Thank you!

[meghananne]

Hey Jessie! Just wondering how to differentiate between unhealthy feathers and a bird who is molting?

[thefirebirdflock]

My budgie keeps sleeping on two feet and eating a lot is he just weird or is he sick, he's still playing with his toys, drinking water normally, and jumping around happily.

[TisiphoneSeraph]

Your bird videos are my favorite hands down. I doubt I'll ever own a bird but they're so fascinating. Would love to see more meet and greets with the smaller birds you showed!

[jessek]

Thank you Jessie. This should be the first video any bird owner should watch.

[DeathDragon-ujed]

I rescued the best budgie ever the other day. He was so kind and loving and just wanted to be with me constantly. He sat with me all day long and only went in his cage at night. He seemed mildly sick but was getting better each day. On the third day of me having him he suddenly had a seizure and passed.

[emiscoolio]

Hi Im very worried that my 3 week old budgie is injured

It's breathing rapidly and can't move it is also smaller than usual

PS the mom keeps stepping on him

What should I do pls reply fast because this is an emergency

[jorgenandersson]

You are abselutely right aboth little Conure died a week ago ....I should have taking her to the VET eight mounts i think she was happy.She was realy sick and she died with pain because she could not get the food down to her stomac....I feel so bad about my little friend that was trusting me!!!I will never forget Kimmi who was my little baby-girl bird!!!

[johnomalley]

Good video! Doesn't seem to happen very often, but this morning he's sneezing fairly continuously. Nothing around his nostrils (dry). Put on the humidifier for now and will check again in a bit.

[jalalmirza]

Thanks a lot of such a informative video.
But my Alexanderian parrot is preening to much, and I have noticed dandruff on his feathers,
What should I do, how should I cure him.
Awaiting for your reply.
Once again thank you very much.

[Taneth]

I wish I'd seen this a year ago. I had a budgie who stopped hopping up onto my finger when I touched her belly, but would still climb up when prompted or step up backwards. I figured she was just nervous about the new roommate. A little while later she stopped chirping in the morning, and when she started to show breathing issues I took her to the vet. It was too late, she had a tumour in the lower abdomen and didn't last two weeks. There were no other symptoms, her stool was fine, feathers neat and shiny, she was flying around by day, standing on one leg and generally being her normal self. In those last two weeks her condition just deteriorated so rapidly.

[davepastern]

what about snoring when they sleep? There doesn't appear to be any rasping when awake or difficulty breathing. There's a small amount of tail bobbing, but Alexandrine parakeets do have a very long tail. The snoring has only recently started in the past few days. We've had her for 12 months now.

She's as active as always, unchanged in feather appearance.

She has started becoming more cage aggressive when covered up at night - she says "f*** off". We adopted her, so this is learned behaviour from previous owner(s). When we adopted her, her health was not good, but with much love and TLC, she has improved in heaps and bounds and our vet has been very happy with her progress. She was aggressive shortly after we got her with regards to her cage territory, around 11 months ago. We think she's going into her breeding cycle and becoming more defensive of her cage area.

[NaelbaFineArt]

I remember when I first got my Amazon Parrot Charlie, he was a dirty olive green, feathers were not in the best condition (although he had not plucked any thankfully), had never had fruit and veg in his diet and was generally panically. I'm glad to say that with the addition of fresh fruit and veg to his pellet diet, regular spray showers (which he loves) and constant attention and fussing his feathers and his temperament improved greatly (he is now a beautiful bright green and the other colours in his plumage have now come out). Im glad to see that according to this list, he is healthy. He has a deformed nostril so occasionally he has a slight whistle when breathing but this rights itself once he has cleared any blockage so not at all worried about that. We are still working on stepping up (he came to me at 4 years old and was not hand trained) but he is not afraid of my hands and loves being scratched and I help him with pin feathers so i think the stepping up is partly due to his 'ill do it myself' stubborn attitude. ha ha. I would love to see more videos with your Amazon (obviously) especially as you are working on his training and may help me with my relationship with my 'feather baby'.

Keep up the good work - bird mums rock!

[amaniadam]

I have a question my 2 months old cockatiel PUFFS UP alot does that mean shes sick or what?

[VicY]

*IMPORTANT WARNING FOR PET BIRD OWNERS* : The food that we normally give to the canaries (and other companion birds) consisting of a "complete, balanced and top-quality seeds mixture" bought in pet stores or malls, makes the owners trust that their pet is well fed, but it's not so: indeed the health of the pets is at imminent and serious risk.

The owners of canaries, parrots, cockatoos, parakeets, cockatiels, etc., WE MUST PAY ATTENTION TO DOMESTIC BIRD BREEDERS AND VETS and keep in mind that although we feed them with such a typical seeds mixture, our birds are very likely in danger of suffering an unexpected, painful and practically inevitable PREMATURE DEATH BY FATTY LIVER DISEASE. Canaries, for example, will surely die at 4 - 6 years of age of the more than 14 that they can live.

It's sad that pet birds are fated to die early and painfully in so many cases. You have to warn people to avoid it!

This deadly disease is very common in pet birds but owners usually don’t know or detect it in time. And we can’t imagine that *THE CAUSE IS IN THE FOOD ITSELF* that we provide to our birds, in which such *a typical mixture contains low-fat seeds such as canary seed together with other VERY fatty seeds such as niger, hemp or nabine and, in addition, the birds usually prefer to eat the fatty seeds* so that their REAL DIET is unbalanced by excessive fat, gradually causes the fatty infiltration of the liver and in a few years causes fatty liver hepatitis and PREMATURE DEATH to pet birds.

*Also the breeding paste and its pigments and the sunflower seeds can attack the liver* if they are taken too much or for too long.

It's a cruel disease that progresses silently and, when its unexpected symptoms begin, they are easily confused with other ailments so the owners usually postpone the visit to the vet at a time already critical for the life of the bird (besides that not all vets are trained to recognize this elusive and misleading disease, even to administer lipotropic and regenerative liver protectors in curative doses, just in case it's that and not a supposed blow). It's a process of slow and asymptomatic progression, but when their visible symptoms begin (acute phase) the disease accelerates.

*SYMPTOMS OF THE ACUTE PHASE OF FATTY LIVER DISEASE* : First, emotional decay or progressive lack of interest, hard belly (in many cases, with a dark spot with a half-moon shape on the belly, which seems a "tumor", to see it you have to wet your fingers to remove the down), falls from the sticks of the cage that seem for "errors of calculation" and then lameness (that make believe that they are by the previous falls, but both symptoms are due to that it hurts the liver), lack of flight and singing, the bird fluffs up his feathers or bends more or less slowly; Then, within a few weeks or a few days, forced breathing with open beak, remaining lying on the floor of the cage near the food, sudden spasms from time to time (which make people believe that the bird is "epileptic" but it are twinges of pain of diseased liver), abundant greenish stools (caused by biliverdin which if it's not fasting, it means hepatic harm), then black and watery (from hepatic hemorrhages), then a strange purplish color of skin and beak, an excessive appetite and the final "improvement" of a few days (in the last phase, the already degenerated liver becomes deflated by what seems to ameliorate), after which it suddenly dies among seizures (which may seem a heart infarct).

For the first symptoms the liver has already degenerated to 80% and only an urgent (and accurate) vet action can save your bird and revert the liver situation. If you simply feed your bird with the loose seeds mixture (even if you give it fresh fruits, vegetables and let it exercise, for example by letting it out of the cage at home), right now your pet's liver is degenerating, and neither you nor your bird know. *Without liver protectors, it's almost certain that your bird will die early and in many cases you won’t be able to determine its real cause* .

Hepatic lipidosis it's not only deadly by itself when the visible symptoms begin (sometimes even it does not warn at all until few moments before the death). Even before the acute phase it predisposes the bird to suffer infections, as it weakens the immune system. Obese pet birds have an higher risk of many other diseases, like arthritis, heart disease and cancer. Obesity in birds it's not so apparent but it's more dangerous than in other animals like mammals.

So in addition to giving to the birds lipotropic and detox / regenerating hepatic protectors preventively and routinely, breeders usually make their own mixtures with low fat seeds.

*PREVENTION AND/OR TREATMENT* : The time to act is NOW that your pet doesn’t have yet the visible symptoms. It's necessary to ACTIVELY PREVENT THE LIVER DEGENERATION. Fortunately it's easy to do it: *It's very advisable to substitute progressively (within some weeks, as per the instructions of the manufacturer) the mixture of loose seeds for some pellets compound food of seeds, fruits and vegetables (preferably those that already include liver protectors), because this prevents the bird from filtering and eating mostly the fatty seeds (but without insisting if the bird does not get accustomed to eating pellets because he could die for starvation within a few days)* .

*And, whatever the diet, it's CRUCIAL to add to the drinking water or to the food a LIPOTROPIC LIVER PROTECTOR that includes carnitine and / or choline, betaine, methionine, etc., (and it's very convenient to add a DETOX / REGENERATING LIVER PROTECTOR with thistle milk, boldo, artichoke extract)* . Liver protectors are not medicine but cheap food supplements manufactured by pet bird vet laboratories that remove the fat from the liver, clean it and favor its recovery. It's essential to add them to the pet birds diet to conserve their liver. It's something that professionals as breeders and vets know, but we the owners usually don't know.

It are appearing in the market compound feed for pet birds that don’t include fatty seeds and that already include several liver protectors. But *the vast majority of owners still confidently feed their birds with the typical mixture of loose seeds with little fat and other very fatty seeds... And their birds continue dying of hepatic lipidosis in a large number of cases (likely, in most cases)* . Now we know that, as fatty liver disease develops from the daily food itself, it’s most likely THE FIRST CAUSE OF DEATH OF PET BIRDS, and more so as the bird ages.

Webs on FLD:

Liver disease is a slow, on-going progressive disease where the liver tissue is replaced with fat. When the liver disease has progressed, the bird may suddenly appear ill.

One of the sadder diseases many avian vets see is that of hepatic lipidosis or fatty liver disease. It's sad in a number of ways since often the birds are very ill, life-threateningly so, or possibly having died suddenly. Often the owners have been unaware of the dangers of feeding their beloved pet the seeds, peanuts, or other fatty foods the bird obviously loves to eat. These are truly cases of "loving your bird to death". Any bird can fall victim to fatty liver disease.

Dietary deficiencies of lipotrophic factors such as choline, biotin, and methionine may decrease the transport of lipids from the liver.


Most any avian symptomatology should be considered as if it were a pathology that could be serious, and not allow the disease to develop because then it will probably be too late. We must closely investigate the symptoms, take preventive measures that don’t harm (such as giving liver and intestinal protectors according to the leaflet) ask for advice from vets, breeders, etc. and procure the most appropriate treatment RAPIDLY, but without rushing in the treatment or with the doses in such small animals. If the days go by and the bird doesn’t improve, it's necessary to continue investigating and, if necessary, change the medication in an informed and contrasted manner. Doing nothing or stopping research usually ends up with the bird dead, but acting without being sure of what is done and in what dose, it likely ends the same way. It's necessary to obtain and confirm the sufficient vet experience and have the serenity to determine in each case whether it's convenient to hasten to do and / or administer what medicine and in what dose, or if it’s better not to do and let the situation evolve without medicating for the time being, or according to the medication that has already been administered.

A limp in a bird is not always an injury caused by a blow, but the symptom of a disease of some organ (usually the liver or an intestinal disease) that needs to be discovered and treated ASAP. When in doubt, change diet to one with the lowest fat possible (only birdseed, or with other low-fat seeds such as millet, chia, fresh fruits and vegetables) and administer lipotropic and regenerating liver protectors in curative doses immediately... although nothing could foresee a fatal outcome. There are also food supplements protectors of the intestinal mucosa and stimulants of the immune system. In doses according to the leaflets do not cause damage, it will surely save the life of your bird (if it's not too late), and will keep them with a basic wellness.