My CAG is egg bound, first time issue :(

[GreenWing]

I've had my CAG parrot for ten years. Never had any problems with this issue before.

She has been more hormonal lately. We just take her back to the cage and distract.

Late last week, I noticed she seemed a little more tired and she had more urine in her stool. I called the avian vet, made an appointment, and they said to keep an eye on her. Over the weekend her stools looked better.

Things seemed a little better for a couple of days, so my worry subsided. But, yesterday night she seemed quiet again. We put her to bed and she woke us up at 3 AM with terrible wheezing sounds. I uncovered her cage and saw several stools under her, she rarely goes poop in her cage (she spends most of her time outside of the cage). As soon as I uncovered her, she vomited.

Then I heard the wheezing sound again. She came out of her cage, her nares look ok, so the wheezing might be something else. She got on her perch and then I saw her vent was moving and she bobbed her tail. The noise was from her vent. Ok, yeah, that's not normal and since she's a hen, it must be an impacted egg!

We are on our way to the only emergency vet open in the area that can see birds. I called her avian vet and left a message, too.

I just hope she will survive this, I'm so scared! Can anyone offer any help or insight as we wait?

Thank you

[Pajarita]

Oh, wow, Greenwing, I am so sorry! Nothing you can do aside from what you are doing. The vet will be able to get the egg out, if that is what she has (I am not sure it is an egg because A) is not their season - B) they can't poop when they are eggbound and C) I've never heard of their vent making a noise). I can't offer any personal opinion because I've never had an eggbound bird. What I do is, when I see them trying to nest (I have now two CAG hens and both lay), I give them a dose of Calcivet. The 'new' hen came to me super hormonal and ended up laying 2 clutches plus an extra egg a bit after she had abandoned the second clutch (which she did not do until the end of April even though their season ends in mid March) but, like I said, an extra dose of calcium per egg does the trick. She will be OK (they can always break the egg and pull it out if she doesn't lay it on her own) and, next time, when you see her showing signs of nesting (they chew a lot, look for dark corners, scratch the floor and ask incessantly for scritches making little puppy-like sounds), give her a nest (a couple of hard cardboard boxes one inside the other on the floor in a quiet corner of the room) and a dose of calciboost or calcivet in her water.

Please let us know what happens.

[GreenWing]

Thank you, Pajarita.

You mention a good point. I saw her vent opening and closing widely, so I assumed it's an egg... but I could be wrong.

Her symptoms:

Started out acting lethargic/lots of water in stools (monitored this, was feeding grapes so wondered if it was this; watery stools subsided and stools look normal). Made an appointment with avian vet for September 18th. Told to continue monitoring. Bird is hormonal, mentioned this.

Seemed to be better over the weekend, albeit seemed tired, had her take naps.

Didn't eat her corn on the cob Tuesday night, very odd. Didn't seem to eat much overall.

Wednesday morning, 3 AM. Woke up to loud wheezing sounds. Uncovered cage to find three droppings (that look normal). Bird vomited/regurgitated. Vent opening and closing with bobbing tail.

Took her to the only open vet immediately. Avian vet doesn't open until 9 AM.

UPDATE: typed all this out and just found out she PASSED the egg! Goodness.

I'm now wondering if I need to change her diet, stat to gloop. How can I help her hormones? Solar schedule, fussy sleeper/bites cage in the night, fully flighted.

[Pajarita]

OH, THANK GOODNESS! Passing the egg on her own is MUCH better than the vet having to remove it.

Now, if you are feeding her gloop and raw produce (of, course, things like corn on the cob, squashes, pumpkins, potatoes, yams, etc. should be cooked) for breakfast and nuts for dinner, and keeping her at a solar schedule, I don't know what else you can do... I also don't know why she is so hormonal right now because that is what I do and it works for all my birds. Greys' breeding season is, more or less, from November to March. My Sophie, who has been with me for 16 years (she is now 23) follows the schedule perfectly. Dubis, the one that has been with me since last October and came in SUPER hormonal, is doing VERY well. It took her too long to abandon her second clutch and she still chews too much but when a bird has not been kept right for many years (she is going on 11, belonged to the same couple all her life and was kept at a human schedule and fed wrong -they sent the 'parrot' mix they used to feed her and which I promptly threw away), it takes a loooong time for their endocrine system to go back on track but she is doing GREAT! She came with plucked chest, belly, neck, back and top of wings and she has allowed her feathers to grow back - her chest and neck still look a bit uneven but it hasn't even been a whole year so I think her recovery has been remarkable.

I highly recommend you do a thorough re-evaluation of your husbandry and I'll tell you why.
I recently cared for a male grey that plucks and mutilates for about 4 weeks smack in the middle of the summer (June to July). The owner is a good friend of mine who has had a number of birds for many years (I've given her some), she is an elementary school teacher, has a master in Biology and volunteers every summer with conservation projects (she went to the Ecuadorian jungle this year) and she was worried he would mutilate and bleed to death in her absence so she asked me to watch him. I always thought she fed right and kept her birds at a solar schedule but she sent his treats and food and I then realized that she was making mistakes. His dinner food was a what is commercially called a very good quality parrot mix but it had sunflower seeds, peanuts and dried fruit treated with sulfites (I put the bin in the basement fridge and remained there untouched until I sent it back) and his treats were yogurt-covered almonds (gave him the sum total of two halves). His food had inferior quality and too much protein and the almonds had not only yogurt but also sugar and high fructose corn syrup). NO GOOD! He would sweetly ask for 'Yogurt?' but I discovered that a pistachio or a 1/4 walnut worked just as well.

I am SUPER strict with my birds light schedule and diet. I make absolutely NO exceptions. They get 2 hours of dawn and even more of dusk because I turn off their lights at 4:30 pm this time of the year (and there are no lights nearby because I live in a rural area, in a 6 acre property with the house 125 ft from the road so not even the lights from passing cars reach them. And they get no treats except for a little piece of a Graham cracker (organic, all natural and sweetened with honey) when I turn off the overhead lights in the afternoon -to give you an idea, Yogi Macaw gets 1/4 of a 'sheet', the greys, amazons, etc get 1/8 and the conures get 1/12. No animal protein ever, no sunflowers, no dried fruit, no salt, no sugar, no processed anything, nothing but gloop, raw produce and nuts (mostly walnuts but also pistachios, cashews and almonds.

So review everything you do and give her and see if you don't need to tweak something.

[GreenWing]

Update: things have been MUCH better. Chance isn't acting hormonal anymore. The dances and vomiting and associated behaviors have ceased.

I have to say mea culpa here. Chance is a very loved (and spoiled!) bird. I kiss her a LOT when she's on my shoulder and I kiss her wings. I also have stroked her wings... yeah, big no no. I always knew I'm not supposed to stroke the bird but I've been showing the bird affection in ways she understood as courtship.

The vet told me to literally stop these behaviors and I am very careful when I scratch only her head now.

Her food seems to be fine but I'm watching the protein intake and giving more chop. She likes chop but I still want to see if she'll like gloop.

The evenings are shorter now and Chance lets me know at dusk that it's time for bed. She says, "come on. Bed. Gotta go to bed." If I don't act right away and put her to bed she will say "bed" nonstop, lol.

Thanks for all the help and yeah, lesson learned.

[Pajarita]

I am VERY happy things are better but, unfortunately, we are going into their breeding season (end of Nov to mid March) because they are short-day breeders so don't be surprised or disappointed if she starts showing signs of being hormonal. I am going to be having the same problem myself with Doobis this year but she will be 100% on track next year.

Now, I am NOT criticizing you (you have now identified the cause and are changing it), I am making a comment for the people who read these posts without actually participating: Whenever a bird is off-season or overly hormonal (showing signs like regurgitating, for example) it is ALWAYS AND WITHOUT EXCEPTION the human's fault. Once should never think that because a bird has done OK with husbandry that is a bit iffy for years the bird will continue to be OK because, when it comes to hormonal problems, the problem is accumulative and, eventually, something bad will happen. And, to put the icing on the cake, the bird that appears OK is actually suffering.

Also, once should never think that one's husbandry is great, one should always and continuously strive to find the perfect tweak to make it better because none of us is actually doing such a GREAT job! I know I still have a lot to learn and room to improve my birds' lives.