Scary overnight incident

[criswell]

In some kind of incident overnight Dexter has broken a blood feather. He seems fine but there is blood all over his wings and the base of the cage. It happened more than halfway through the night as there was quite a large pile of droppings under his swing, so most likely early this morning. The blood was dry when I uncovered them at 10am. As well as the blood on the paper there is blood up the sides of the plastic base, even over the other side of the cage so he must have flapped about a lot, poor little buddy. I will be keeping a close eye on him today, but he doesn't seem especially bothered.

 

 

[lemonora]

Ohh glad he’s ok
That must’ve been terrifying for you
To see all that blood
Hope this doesn’t happen again and hopefully he’s not affected by it

[Loz]

Poor Dexter and poor Criswell! I've found drops of blood in the past and that was scary enough.

Glad he seems OK.

[criswell]

Thanks lemonora and loz. It was scary for me but I was surprisingly calm about it. I think that's because I saw that everyone was ok first before I saw the blood on the cage paper. I anxiously looked them all over and found the blood on Dexter, and since he wasn't distressed by it I didn't panic.

He's been up on top of the speaker with Rito and he's eating and drinking like normal so I think he's ok. I won't be surprised if he takes some extra naps today. He's not needed one yet. I offered him a bath but he declined which is probably sensible as I wouldn't want to start anything bleeding again. He'll be a blue, white and red Dexter for a couple of days until he's ready for a bath.

The cage needs a bit of cleaning but I'm waiting for an opportunity when they are all out as I don't want to scare anyone.

[Ira]

Oh bless him!
Looks like maybe something spooked him and he bashed a flight feather?
At least he doesn't seem concerned.

[Marianne Marlow]

I'm glad Dexter is okay. It's very scary when these things happen. It's only happened to one of my birds a long time ago.

Thankfully he was okay.

[criswell]

Thanks Ira and Marianne Marlow. It does seem likely that something spooked him. At about 6am I woke up hearing a weird thumping noise from outside or next door so maybe that was it. I got a look at his wing when he was preening it and the flight feather on the very edge of his wing is bloody all along the shaft. I've not noticed any difference in his behaviour all day so I'm glad he's taken it in his stride.

I've only ever seen blood in the cage once before and that was much less, just a splat on a perch near where Randolph Carter had been sleeping. I couldn't actually see any blood on him or Dexter on that occasion though.

[Azalea]

This has happened with our Sun Conure and one of our Cockatiels. They both acted normal. I hope Dexter will be just fine, also.

[criswell]

Thanks Azalea. He was his usual self all day yesterday. He just looks quite gory still!

They got to bed on their usual swings last night so hopefully they will have had a more peaceful night. They were all in the wrong places the night before so that might have contributed to the incident.

[Loz]

I recall seeing Maddy Prior covered in blood one morning. That was disturbing.
Eventually I found the broken feather that was the source of the problem but until then, I'd had a mystery that was a worry.

[criswell]

They all slept well last night and Dexter's been his chirpy little self all day. He just looks a bit like an extra from a horror movie.

It's one of the best things about the forum that we can share experiences like this. It's because I'd previously read your posts about similar incidents that I didn't panic yesterday.

So thank you every one

[Marianne Marlow]

Hopefully all is well this morning.

It is good that we can share these things here