ddobs
New member
Our youngest parakeet, Pip, died unexpectedly early one morning a week ago. We got him at a rescue just over a year ago. We believed he was young based on his "feet" (pink and young looking), and his overall appearance. When we found him, it appeared he fell from his perch. We paid for a necropsy by a vet who treats birds on occasion. There are no certified avian vets in our city. The vet said he was perfectly healthy except for his lower intestine, which was black. She surmised that it somehow became twisted through movement or stress, blocking blood flow, then went into shock and died. She didn't see any blockage (e.g., nothing ingested causing the blockage), and no problem with food (he was "clean", probably because they digest quickly and he hadn't eaten his morning food). Conditioning was good. Still struggling to understand how this could have happened as he was busy eating dinner right before we shut off the lights for the night. We had transitioned him and our other birds from Roudybush to Harrison's weeks before, but he was eating. They have a toy with natural fibers that they chew on, but again, vet said there was nothing indicating the bird ingested something it couldn't pass. Has anyone had a problem with the lower intestine like this that caused the death of their bird?
