Swollen Budgie Eye

RE: Swollen Budgie Eye

grumpyoldman — Fri, 11 Dec 2015 21:11:50 GMT

The problem is that they will insist on keeping high value AGPs with cockatiels etc in the petshops pre-sale, or trade them on gumtree without seeing where they are buying them from , they test the AGPs sometimes or have them from "free" sources but anything could be happening with the cockatiels ,they are often asymptomatic carriers, no one ever tests them in the shops because they don't get ill .

There is an immuncomb test ,but its a real faff ,my nurses hate it ,takes ages , same principle and dots as the polyvalent dog antigen test kits.

RE: Swollen Budgie Eye

Gillian Mostyn — Fri, 11 Dec 2015 08:56:10 GMT

I had the local council licensing officer ring me in a panic last week....she'd been notified of a case of psittacosis in a man who had recently bought 6 parrots. She was all ready to go and shut down the pet shop!!!!!

RE: Swollen Budgie Eye

Marie Kubiak — Fri, 11 Dec 2015 08:39:10 GMT

Very common! Reported rates vary massively though from 16-81% and in our captive bred birds it is likely to be the lower end of this range.

Marie

RE: Swollen Budgie Eye

Stephen Courtney — Thu, 10 Dec 2015 16:51:42 GMT

I hadn't thought of Psittacosis - my bad! I've never seen a case - how common is it?

RE: Swollen Budgie Eye

Marie Kubiak — Thu, 10 Dec 2015 15:30:23 GMT

Looks like a sinusitis - the periocular sinus tends to cause a circular swelling with soft feel to it on palpation. Mycoplasma is probable in an aviary bird in indirect contact with wild birds but would be unlikely in an indoor bird. Chlamydia (psittacosis) or secondary opportunistic infection associated with hypovitaminosis A are the most common factors in pet budgies. Psittacosis is zoonotic, the father didn't die of respiratory disease did he??? Mycobacteriosis (low zoonotic potential) and lymphoma are other possible factors but are rare in budgies.

Given the zoonotic potential I would strongly advise the owners to test for psittacosis (if you have in house kits it only costs about £30, lab serology or PCR are more expensive and PCR is useless if any antibiotics have been given already).

Marie

RE: Swollen Budgie Eye

Anthony Dennison — Thu, 10 Dec 2015 15:23:42 GMT

[quote user="Stephen Courtney"]But I wouldn't write the bird off straight away.[/quote]

Oh I don't want to, I'm for treatment. It's just one of those owners that wants a magic fix for not much money. Hence why I need to get as much information as possible to convince the owner!

RE: Swollen Budgie Eye

Stephen Courtney — Thu, 10 Dec 2015 14:39:53 GMT

A three year old budgie is not that old! Nice to see how much he reminds her of her dear old Dad...

I'd be thinking some sort of mycoplasma infection, so would be looking at ornicure , and possibly a jury rigged E collar, with a strong dose of poor prognosis.

Ornicure is pretty cheap, for budgies I usually dissolve the sachet in 500ml of distilled water, keep stock solution in the fridge and refill the drinkers daily, avoiding metal containers. treat for at least 3 weeks. Most ocular and respiratory infections in small birds seem to be responsive to doxycycline, of course this could be something nastier, hence the need for a good dose of realism. But I wouldn't write the bird off straight away.