Within the last week I started to notice that Kiwi my conure was having what sounded to me like a little cough. When she would get worked up from flying or climbing around on her cage it sounded like she might be sneezing a little or coughing. I listened closely for a day or two and decided this wasn’t normal breething behavior for her so I called around to the local vet offices.
Unfortunately where I live there are no board certified avian vets. I did find one who has been raising birds for a long time and at least seemed to have a pretty good knowledge of what could be wrong with her.
When she heard Kiwi breathing she said it’s possible she has some sort of respitory infection and suggested we use some antibitoics to clear this up. This worried me some as the antibiotics are to be administed by mouth and I knew my little conure wasn’t going to be too excited about that.
While at the office the vet showed me the easiest way to wrap little Kiwi up in a towell and feed her the medicine via syringe. She of course does not like being wrapped up in the towell but she seems to like the antibiotics ok. Cherry Flavor!!
The vet also said we need to take special precaution to keep Kiwis’ level of stress down. So she gets to be pretty low key the next week or so with no real training or action. We moved her cage as well as it was under a heat duct which the vet said it’s important not to have any drafts on her even if it’s warm air.
So we’ll keep an eye on her and continue giving her the antibiotics which seem to be a bitter sweet experience for her and hopefully she’ll feel better. It’s very important that if you notice any sort of simliar problem with your parrot or conure that you take them to a vet as soon as you can. They are simple just a little more fragile than other animals and need care sooner.
