EllenD
New member
- Aug 20, 2016
- 3,979
- 68
- Parrots
- Senegal Parrot named "Kane"; Yellow-Sided Green Cheek Conure named "Bowie"; Blue Quaker Parrot named "Lita Ford"; Cockatiel named "Duff"; 8 American/English Budgie Hybrids; Ringneck Dove named "Dylan"
I'm glad he is seemingly improving...Which Probiotic are you giving him? Make sure that you continue to give him a dose of the Probiotics daily for at least a good week or two AFTER he finishes the Doxy, as it is a very strong, broad-spectrum antibiotic, and it will certainly kill-off a lot of the healthy/normal bacterial throughout his GI Tract, if not all of it. I'd keep smelling his breath daily to see if you still smell the sour, "yeasty" smell. If the yeasty smell is not coming from his crop but rather the outside of his body, like from his skin/feathers, then this is why the Vet prescribed the Chlorhexidine, but there are two problems with this: #1 you absolutely cannot spray it all over him, or anywhere near him (or anyone else, specifically near their face), and #2 it's a very poor treatment for an external yeast/fungal infection such as this...I think you mentioned that the yeasty-smell was coming from his body, but I'm not sure if you mentioned his breath or not...
You can certainly still use the Hibiclens on his body, it can't hurt him and it may help a topical fungal infection if that's what he has, you just can't "spray" it on him! That Vet was extremely irresponsible in providing you Hibiclens in a spray-bottle and telling you to spray it on him, as he's a small bird and there's no way at all to spray it on his body without getting it near or actually in his eyes, ears, mouth/beak, and vent (it cannot come in-contact with his vent/cloaca area either, mucous membrane)...
I would advise you to use a cotton-ball or piece of sterile gauze and dab it sparingly in the Hibiclens and then apply it to his body topically once daily (it forms a protective barrier against most bacteria and some other microbes for up to 24 hours, so no need to apply it more than once daily, even to an open wound); however, because it will need to dry on his feathers/skin and stay on them daily and cannot be rinsed off, I'd be very nervous about him preening himself and it getting all throughout the inside of his mouth, tongue, throat, and even into his crop, and as i already mentioned, it's extremely harmful to all mucous membranes, the eyes, and the ears...So I would NEVER apply it all over his body...I have used Hibiclens several times to clean a topical wound on my birds, dogs, myself, etc., and it works great and I highly recommend it over Betadine, Hydrogen Peroxide, Bactine, etc. However, dabbing it on an open wound and allow it to dry to form a protective barrier from infection for 24 hours is a lot different than applying it all over his feathers/body!!! Typically a bird is not going to dig at an open would that much because it's painful, so applying it topically to an open wound for a day or two is not going to be a big deal, they aren't going to get enough of it in their mouths to cause a problem...In contrast, whether you spray it or apply it, doesn't matter, if it's applied all over his feathers/skin all over his body, not only can it accidentally get into their vent/cloaca, their eyes, or their ears, but you know that it's going to basically be inside their mouths all day long, getting inside every time they preen themselves anywhere. That's the issue...if you get Hibiclens inside of your mouth, it can destroy your tastebuds, and more importantly it can and will destroy mucous membranes in your mouth, your salivary glands, etc. And with such a small bird, if you apply it all over them and they get it in their mouths/beaks all day long, it's going to get to their throats, their crops, etc. This could cause serious damage...and again, why that vet would tell you to "spray it" anywhere near a tiny little bird, let alone spray it all over his body, is totally beyond me, unless they aren't aware of how dangerous it is to eyes, ears, and mucous membranes...in which case they shouldn't be prescribing it in the first place...this information is widely available all over the internet, as well as on the box/in the literature it comes with!!! If you do a quick Google search for Hibiclens, you'll find that it has caused deafness and blindness in many, many animals and people, as they've unknowingly used it to treat an ear infection, eye infection, etc. Lots of people use it in their dog's ears when they have a bad yeast infection or bacterial infection that produces a smelly discharge, and yes, it will clear it right up, it's great, but within days their dogs are completely and irreversibly deaf...and sometimes also blind if it managed to spread from the inside of their ears to their eyes...it's great stuff, but it's also dangerous stuff that must only be used responsibly, and your vet didn't prescribe it that way...hopefully you weren't using it that way long enough to cause any damage, and hopefully no over-spray got into his eye/ears or mouth...
I'm sorry you're going through this...It's bad enough when your family member is ill or injured and you're worried sick about it, but it's so much worse when you go to a Vet for help making them better and they do things that don't help, make them worse, etc. It sounds like he's doing fine and improving on his own, without much medical intervention, so that's good. Either way, the Probiotics are something that I have been giving all 4 of my birds every single day for years, and not one of them has ever been sick with anything like a bacterial or fungal infection, no GI issues at all, nothing. I take a Probiotic every day myself, so why not give it to them every day as well to keep their GI Tracts/overall health good...Probiotics can't hurt them at all, only help, so why not...and my CAV totally endorses them, he also has been giving his B&G Macaw a human Probiotic supplement with added Digestive Enzymes every single day for years and years with the same positive results.
Keep us update, don't worry too much about the tail-bob, sometimes tail-bobs can be a "red-herring", so try to focus on the more definitive signs/symptoms that you know indicate that he's not feeling well, such as a drop or total loss of appetite, stop in drinking water, lethargy, sleeping more than normal for him, hanging out at the bottom of his cage, any shaking, unsteadiness, etc., vomiting, loose, runny, or watery droppings, etc. Not that tail-bobbing isn't a valid sign of illness, but it's not nearly as definitive as the above signs/symptoms I listed, and sometimes a tail-bob is actually not really a "tail-bob" at all, meaning it's not an "I'm sick" tail-bob; usually an "I'm sick" tail-bob is almost always accompanied by one or more of the more definitive signs/symptoms...
You can certainly still use the Hibiclens on his body, it can't hurt him and it may help a topical fungal infection if that's what he has, you just can't "spray" it on him! That Vet was extremely irresponsible in providing you Hibiclens in a spray-bottle and telling you to spray it on him, as he's a small bird and there's no way at all to spray it on his body without getting it near or actually in his eyes, ears, mouth/beak, and vent (it cannot come in-contact with his vent/cloaca area either, mucous membrane)...
I would advise you to use a cotton-ball or piece of sterile gauze and dab it sparingly in the Hibiclens and then apply it to his body topically once daily (it forms a protective barrier against most bacteria and some other microbes for up to 24 hours, so no need to apply it more than once daily, even to an open wound); however, because it will need to dry on his feathers/skin and stay on them daily and cannot be rinsed off, I'd be very nervous about him preening himself and it getting all throughout the inside of his mouth, tongue, throat, and even into his crop, and as i already mentioned, it's extremely harmful to all mucous membranes, the eyes, and the ears...So I would NEVER apply it all over his body...I have used Hibiclens several times to clean a topical wound on my birds, dogs, myself, etc., and it works great and I highly recommend it over Betadine, Hydrogen Peroxide, Bactine, etc. However, dabbing it on an open wound and allow it to dry to form a protective barrier from infection for 24 hours is a lot different than applying it all over his feathers/body!!! Typically a bird is not going to dig at an open would that much because it's painful, so applying it topically to an open wound for a day or two is not going to be a big deal, they aren't going to get enough of it in their mouths to cause a problem...In contrast, whether you spray it or apply it, doesn't matter, if it's applied all over his feathers/skin all over his body, not only can it accidentally get into their vent/cloaca, their eyes, or their ears, but you know that it's going to basically be inside their mouths all day long, getting inside every time they preen themselves anywhere. That's the issue...if you get Hibiclens inside of your mouth, it can destroy your tastebuds, and more importantly it can and will destroy mucous membranes in your mouth, your salivary glands, etc. And with such a small bird, if you apply it all over them and they get it in their mouths/beaks all day long, it's going to get to their throats, their crops, etc. This could cause serious damage...and again, why that vet would tell you to "spray it" anywhere near a tiny little bird, let alone spray it all over his body, is totally beyond me, unless they aren't aware of how dangerous it is to eyes, ears, and mucous membranes...in which case they shouldn't be prescribing it in the first place...this information is widely available all over the internet, as well as on the box/in the literature it comes with!!! If you do a quick Google search for Hibiclens, you'll find that it has caused deafness and blindness in many, many animals and people, as they've unknowingly used it to treat an ear infection, eye infection, etc. Lots of people use it in their dog's ears when they have a bad yeast infection or bacterial infection that produces a smelly discharge, and yes, it will clear it right up, it's great, but within days their dogs are completely and irreversibly deaf...and sometimes also blind if it managed to spread from the inside of their ears to their eyes...it's great stuff, but it's also dangerous stuff that must only be used responsibly, and your vet didn't prescribe it that way...hopefully you weren't using it that way long enough to cause any damage, and hopefully no over-spray got into his eye/ears or mouth...
I'm sorry you're going through this...It's bad enough when your family member is ill or injured and you're worried sick about it, but it's so much worse when you go to a Vet for help making them better and they do things that don't help, make them worse, etc. It sounds like he's doing fine and improving on his own, without much medical intervention, so that's good. Either way, the Probiotics are something that I have been giving all 4 of my birds every single day for years, and not one of them has ever been sick with anything like a bacterial or fungal infection, no GI issues at all, nothing. I take a Probiotic every day myself, so why not give it to them every day as well to keep their GI Tracts/overall health good...Probiotics can't hurt them at all, only help, so why not...and my CAV totally endorses them, he also has been giving his B&G Macaw a human Probiotic supplement with added Digestive Enzymes every single day for years and years with the same positive results.
Keep us update, don't worry too much about the tail-bob, sometimes tail-bobs can be a "red-herring", so try to focus on the more definitive signs/symptoms that you know indicate that he's not feeling well, such as a drop or total loss of appetite, stop in drinking water, lethargy, sleeping more than normal for him, hanging out at the bottom of his cage, any shaking, unsteadiness, etc., vomiting, loose, runny, or watery droppings, etc. Not that tail-bobbing isn't a valid sign of illness, but it's not nearly as definitive as the above signs/symptoms I listed, and sometimes a tail-bob is actually not really a "tail-bob" at all, meaning it's not an "I'm sick" tail-bob; usually an "I'm sick" tail-bob is almost always accompanied by one or more of the more definitive signs/symptoms...
I do not let her drink Mt dew! This is her playing with empty can. I don't know if you see her featheres are looking rough 
