One nostrils looks a bit dirty

[Mohitgaur088]

She's having a thing now, it looks like a lil bit dirt in one nostril, its not puss or mucuos, no discharge. I couldn't ignore it but what worries me is that in that incident of medicine coming out of nostril...it was just coming out of one nostril, nothing was coming out of that a lil bit dirty nostril. Through there haven't been any incident of open mouth breathing or anything else. What should I do with that nostril? I don't wanna try cleaning it with Q Tip, she won't let me clean it.

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[Laurasea]

Birds nasal secretions from an infection don't have to look like puss or mucus. They are usually a dry exudate, or crumbly, they often just plug the nostril from the inside , and people don't even know they have a sinus or respiratory infection at all.... This can be even more true of a yeast or fungus type infection. Birds have a completely different type of respiratory system than us or mammals. Though just to make things fun they can have runny or wet nostrils from infection too. Or this can be the case if the medicine just drying and leaving a crust behind from when it came out the nostril.. you can take a flashlight and shine it in the nostrils and compare the two to see if you can tell if it is plugged, note you won't always be able to tell from the outside.

 

[EllenD]

Yeah, based on the illness she's been battling (Upper Respiratory symptoms/sinus, all connected), it's likely that one of her nostrils is blocked with a "plug" of dried mucous/secretions. You may be able to see it, you may not, but what you're seeing right at the nostril "hole" isn't likely the plug, it's probably further back into that side of her sinus passage before it branches-off and connects to the other side, and that's why it's only plugged on the one side...

If it's plugged enough that it's actually blocked and no water/air can get through, it probably isn't going to resolve itself...Under normal circumstances, if you had a Certified Avian Vet/Avian Specialist near you, I would tell you that she needs to be seen, and the common treatment for this is a "Nasal/Sinus Flush", where the Avian Vet (who knows what they're doing with specifically a bird) takes a very large-volume, plastic syringe without a needle on it but rather a special plastic tip that is skinny and slightly curved, and they fill the syringe with typically just sterile saline, and they insert the tip of the syringe into the nostril that is NOT BLOCKED, while holding the bird over a sink and with the bird laying in their had with the BLOCKED SIDE DOWN, TOWARDS THE SINK. Then they push the sterile saline in through the nostril that is NOT blocked, and it eventually goes through to the other side, clears the blockage, and the fluid and exudate starts running out of the blocked side into the sink...They usually do this a few times until they know the blockage is completely gone, and until the sterile saline running out of the blocked side is completely clear in color and contains no more exudate....They also usually collect the very first liquid/exudate that comes out of the blocked side and send it out for a culture, as well as looking at in under their microscope for bacteria, fungi/yeast, parasites, white blood cells, etc.

****Now I'm assuming that this is all due to the Psittacosis Chlamydia, as obviously the main set of symptoms are all Upper Respiratory and also the Conjunctivitis in her eyes...And the eyes are also directly connected-to and also drain-into the same sinus passages that the nostrils are connected to, so in addition to dried mucous from her Respiratory System, there is probably a good amount of the pus/thick mucous from her eye on the same side as the blocked nostril, as it's draining directly down right into that nostril. So basically all of that crap from her eyes and her Upper Respiratory System is draining out right down into her sinuses, and this is most-likely what has caused a hard, dried plug to form in that nostril...

This might resolve itself by simply dislodging due to her breathing, however often they don't resolve themselves, and the problem is that obviously they can become blocked on BOTH SIDES, and that's when you're going to see open-mouth breathing,
because it's the only way they can breath...And sometimes they actually will start open-mouth breathing with only one-side blocked as well, because they are not used to the decreased air-flow through their nostrils.

So, you're going to have to watch her carefully to make sure she isn't open-mouth breathing, because if that starts then she could go into respiratory distress at any time...The other thing that I'll mention only because I've seen it happen before more than a few times is where an owner brings their bird in because they've been open-mouth breathing and had some other upper-respiratory symptoms, and the CAV does a nasal flush just to clear the sinuses out and give the bird some relief (plus they want to do a culture on the flush), and they discover that one side is completely plugged, so they decide to take a regular x-ray, and they discover that the bird actually has a growth in that side of their sinus passages, which is benign and not at all cancerous or life-threatening in that respect 99% of the time, but is rather just a Polyp. Sometimes they do nothing and let it alone and take an x-ray every few months to see if the Polyp is growing, if it's not growing and the bird isn't having issues breathing they leave it alone; if the Polyp is growing or if the bird is having trouble breathing, they'll put the bird under short-term anesthesia and use and Endoscope and attachments to go right up into the nostril and "De-bulk" the Polyp, meaning they remove as much of the Polyp that they can safely and non-invasively, and they might end-up having to De-bulk the Polyp once a year or so because it shows that it's growing back on the regular x-rays. Sometimes they can get the whole thing this way and it's fine. The problem is that there is no safe way to perform a surgical procedure and remove the entire Polyp because of how small a bird's head/face is, and they'd be dangerously close to the brain, eyes, and ears, not to mention how vascularized that area is, and the chances of bird bleeding to death is extremely high; there are also very crucial nerves that run through that area, and they could end-up blinding the bird, causing facial paralysis, etc. So doing the De-bulking through the nostril with an Endoscope every so often when they see the Polyp growing larger is the safest way to treat the situation and keep the bird breathing normally...

In the case of your bird it's most-likely not a growth at all, it's just a plug on that side of her sinus passages from all of the junk draining from her eyes and upper respiratory system. Hopefully it passes itself, but again, if you see her starting the open-mouth breathing again, then you've got to get her to an Avian Vet who knows how to properly and safely do a Nasal Flush to clear the blockage. I've done them more than a few times at the Rescue and it's not difficult at all to do, but I was shown how by my CAV step-by-step...The main risk is obviously not holding the bird at the correct downward-angle so that the saline and the exudate flows out of the blocked nostril and not down into their lungs/respiratory system. So you want someone who knows what they're doing and has done it before. Hopefully it clears itself and she doesn't have any trouble with it...Poor thing, she can't get a break, can she...She has so much mucous/pus draining from her eyes and her respiratory system, she must be all clogged-up...

 

[noodles123]

Bird mucous can be wet but not always.
Bird dust/dander (in powder-down birds) can also sometimes clog a nostril.
It depends on the type of bird, symptoms etc....A simple blood test (CBC) will tell you about the possibility of infection etc as well, but with long-term fungal infections, blood isn't always accurate either....