Taking Archie to vet

[Ira7]

He wasn’t a happy camper, and it wasn’t so easy getting him into the carrier. Thank God my wife was there to calm him down and get him. He now knows what that “blue thing” is, and didn’t even want to come out of the cage.

Ironically, once in the car, he chatted up a storm. About a 20-minute drive.

I’m killing an hour now until they call me to pick him up. And he might be a she:

I’m having him sexed. Only 40 bucks.

 

[Scott]

Oh yeah, they know what the travel carrier means!

50/50 odds, you'll soon know!

 

[wrench13]

And....... ?

 

[Ira7]

And....... ?

Everything is fine. The vet looked at the smears, and said everything looks fine. But we still have to wait however long for the professional lab results to come in.

Here are the salient points:

1) He weighed him at 470. I got a read of 468 two days before, so my scale is cool.

Last year, he was at 478 at the vet (hatch certificate said 495, but that’s just an unverifiable weight that the store filled in when I bought him). So we’re showing an 8 grams loss over a year.

2) The “official” data says YNAs are 480 to 680, but he said BS. There’s always an overlap in these species’ data points. And they don’t take into account SIZE. Some birds will always fall at the very low end of the length scale and some on the high end.

Archie also gets much more protein than other people here will accept. He is NOT a big eater, so every week, he gets either a few quail eggs, or a chicken wing. He normally eats tons of veggies, but there are days...even with peppers...where he loses interest and just doesn’t eat it.

3) I would have had the DNA sexing test done on him LAST year, but this was never explained to me properly. So I was pissed to learn this yesterday, and pleasantly surprised:

I didn’t know that in his first visit last year, they quipped a nail to get blood for one of the tests anyway! I didn’t want to hurt him like that, after having him just 2 days...and no one told me that they do that anyway. Duh?

So yesterday, as the girl is about to take Archie in (I have to wait in my car or a bar for an hour), I quickly mention the DNA test, and she tells me they’re taking blood this time again. So I say do the test. Just 40 bucks.

I’m 99% sure Archie is a she, based on size, weight and temperament, but we’ll see.

4) He was a freaking pisser going there and coming back, chattering up a storm in the carrier as if he ENJOYED the whole damn thing!

 

[SailBoat]

Our DYH loads in the the carrier with easy. Likely because he is riding some place at least once a week. So, going to the Vet is a bit rare. It helps that he is a road warrior and loves to ride in the SUV. That said, when we turn on to the road that his Vet's clinic is on, he locks in on where we are going and provides a string of NO, NO, NO!

Most of the hen YN's have been on the big side commonly North of 550+. But at this point, still young.

 

[Ira7]

Our DYH loads in the the carrier with easy. Likely because he is riding some place at least once a week. So, going to the Vet is a bit rare. It helps that he is a road warrior and loves to ride in the SUV. That said, when we turn on to the road that his Vet's clinic is on, he locks in on where we are going and provides a string of NO, NO, NO!

Most of the hen YN's have been on the big side commonly North of 550+. But at this point, still young.

I can’t drive myself crazy worrying about it.

S/he is what s/he is, and this is the weight. It’s not like she doesn’t always have food to eat.

S/he’s just not a big eater. I can’t even find a treat s/he cares about:

When I present anything, it’s like screw the food. I just want to get on his hand.

 

[Ira7]

Our DYH loads in the the carrier with easy. Likely because he is riding some place at least once a week. So, going to the Vet is a bit rare. It helps that he is a road warrior and loves to ride in the SUV. That said, when we turn on to the road that his Vet's clinic is on, he locks in on where we are going and provides a string of NO, NO, NO!

Most of the hen YN's have been on the big side commonly North of 550+. But at this point, still young.

I went to Pet Supermarket today to buy another tub of Nutriberries, because last week, like an idiot, I bought the wrong kind. I bought the cockatiel tub, which looks exactly the same except they show a cockatiel, and not an Amazon size bird.

And no, he didn’t like it and told me to drop dead.

But the woman at the counter was assembling some cool new pet carriers, one was white with those old-fashioned decals of traveling to different places of the world, like they used to do on suitcases.

So I’m thinking about trashing the old one, and buying this new one, to associate mostly positive experiences with it for him.

 

[noodles123]

I trashed Noodles' old carrier because I felt like our first travel together was very stressful. I felt bad, because it worked, but it just seemed too scary to put her back in after all of that. I also didn't like how shadowy it was (as it was modified for a bird from a dog/cat carrier, due to airline travel etc).

 

[SailBoat]

Our DYH loads in the the carrier with easy. Likely because he is riding some place at least once a week. So, going to the Vet is a bit rare. It helps that he is a road warrior and loves to ride in the SUV. That said, when we turn on to the road that his Vet's clinic is on, he locks in on where we are going and provides a string of NO, NO, NO!

Most of the hen YN's have been on the big side commonly North of 550+. But at this point, still young.

I can’t drive myself crazy worrying about it.

S/he is what s/he is, and this is the weight. It’s not like she doesn’t always have food to eat.

S/he’s just not a big eater. I can’t even find a treat s/he cares about:

When I present anything, it’s like screw the food. I just want to get on his hand.

My point is you Girl /Boy is still young and like the other three big Amazons, they do not obtain full growth /weight until they are 8 to 10 years of age.