Quaker chewing at feet

[ONBirdLady]

Hello, my less than 1 year old quaker has recently started chewing at his feet. yesterday i noticed a small scab and today i found another. i immediately did a complete cage clean, and removed all rough perches within his cage. His feet seem to have white flakey skin on them, which makes me believe he has dry skin (correct me if I'm wrong). is there anything i can use to help with his skin?

also, he just ate rasperries/strawberries and now his poop is extremely dark in colour. i know that their poop changes depending on what they eat, but this colour didn't seem right.

 

[Puck]

You can rub aloe on the skin. How often do you bathe him? As for the droppings, I know it can take on the color of what they eat. If it was fine then he ate the berries and it changed, then it's probably the berries. I would wait a little while and see if the feces return to a normal color. What about it in particular doesn't seem right?

 

[MikeyTN]

They do chew in their feet to clean themselves so that's not abnormal. But when you say scab, are you able to post pics? For the above post, I just want to add when we say aloe, we do meant the all natural kind from the plant itself.

 

[ONBirdLady]

he takes baths in his water dish almost every day. Id prefer if he didn't, but i try to give him better baths in the sink (my conure loves running through the dripping tap), but he wants nothing to do with it. Im going to start misting him from now on, see if that works better. His butt doesn't even fit in the water dish fully, so i doubt he's getting a PROPER bath.


the poop has gone back to normal it was just a very dark dark green so i was concerned.

I will try to take a picture but he's difficult to get to sit still.


if i get a picture, i will post it. They are red in colour, but small.

 

[ONBirdLady]

these are the best photos i could get. This is the scab i found today.


Could lack of vitamin A be cause for dry skin? He gets a strict pellet diet (Harrison's High Potency & Tropican), with fruits and veggies (when he actually eats them), and pasta occasionally but not that often.

He's never interested in eating the veggies or fruit. Only after they've been there for a few hours, and i go to take them away, does he want to eat them. I don't know what to do! he's seeing the vet tomorrow anyway, but still I'm worried about my little fart

 

[Puck]

Have you tried hand feeding him sweet corn or peas? Right now my Quaker Sammy wants nothing to do with any greens that don't resemble nuts or seeds, but he likes the inner parts of green beans, peas, and sweet corn. He actually "shells" the corn like a nut, eating the inside and leaving the skin.

 

[MikeyTN]

He definitely hurt his foot somehow. When they're young they can be kinda rough so you just wouldn't know how he did it. And they would kept picking at it before it even have a chance to heal. I don't think it's vitamin A deficiency but the vet can tell you more once you take him in.

 

[LadiDy]

My Macaw on occasion has dry feet were she'll peel the dead dry skin off, causing red sore spots. Our AV ordered a cream called Soother Plus by Healx and I have seen it online at Everything Birdie.com. It also comes in a spray. It works well for us, provides pain/itch relief. It does have aloe vera juice as an ingredient.

 

[ONBirdLady]

Thanks everyone! You've all been a lot of help!

the vet said that its not dry skin, and that he's unsure as to why he's doing it since he is getting everything he needs (good diet, perch options, etc). He ruled out bumble foot (thank god), and said thats he's an over all happy, healthy bird. He said it may be behavioural, but he doubts it.

he did give me a cream to avoid infection in case it does occur. The cream also moisturizes his feet a little, and they look a lot better.

 

[MikeyTN]

That's good to hear! Hopefully he'll stop chewing up his foot like that! I'm curious to why he does it at this age.