I took Keiko to the vet Saturday for a health exam and it was a total eye opener! The vet was great! She came in talking...not to me, but to Keiko. As she talked she was making a visual assessment. I do not have an "alpha" bird and she says he will be a sweetheart, very easy to train and work with. Afterwards, she told me he lacked the natural curiosity of a normal AG, had poor posture, and 'weak' coloring. In a nutshell, he was sick! I would have never known...
His weight was 400 grams at 5 months and she thought this was just underweight for his size. She routinely exams the droppings and they showed an extremely high bacteria count. We did some blood work to figure out the problem in addition to the DNA sexing. I was sent home with some antibiotics and I get the test results back Monday.
I was in her office for 2 hours. She was great at showing me some things to do and answering my questions. She said some quick ways to tell if a bird is sick before it becomes completely obvious were the droppings should be a dull brown, not green; beaks should be very dark gray, or black, and somewhat shiny; feathers should be shiny, eyes and nose clear.
I wonder if anyone else has any clues indicating a sick bird?
