More than a moult?

Bezukhov has not been right.  He has been moulting so has been under the weather, however today, after some very dodgy looking poops, I decided his problem may be more than his moult.  I quickly arranged an afternoon visit to Ms Exotic Hospital Vet (EHV).

It is always difficult to know when a vet visit is necessary.  Is he just moulting?  Will the stress of taking him to the vet make him worse?  Will he be okay tomorrow?  Is he hiding something very serious?  Is he actually worse than he looks?  I usually base my visits on my gut feeling & if I am worried to the extent that I cannot do anything else then that is the time to take him!

In here? Again?

I don’t wanna be in here!

There must be some way out…

 

So, Bezukhov & Ms EHV met again.  She could see how rough he looked, with his feathers all over the place, not to mention the feathers around his beak that are saturated with sticky medicine.  All clinical signs appeared fine, but the most noticeable thing was that he has lost weight.  This I was expecting, as he lost his appetite but it appeared to return today, although I wondered/worried if the need to eat a lot was a symptom of something else.  Ms EHV weighed him – he was only 38g.  That is a 10g+ drop from last time & potentially a drop that has happened since we lost Cagney just over 4 weeks ago.

I explained how difficult life has been for him since that time, his loss of appetite, his loss of routine, having to build a new relationship of some sort with Phineas, the continuing medication saga & a new home (yes, I am behind with my posts – I did say a new home!)

Ms EHV believes his problems are stress related.  The first thing we must do is make sure he does not lose any more weight.  As he appeared to be eating more today & the difficulty of eating alongside Phineas seems to be settling, we are hopeful he will begin to put on weight.  Once he does, his poops should start to improve.  I am to monitor him over the next few days & if he does not put more weight on, then he is to have blood tests to see if something else is going on internally.

Overnight poops

Very dodgy poops

Is this for real?

 

We did have a first in the consulting room – whilst Ms EHV was examining Bezukhov he managed to get free of her hand.  He was flying round & round the room, up by the ceiling.  He finally came down & landed on top of the cage but neither myself or Ms EHV caught him so off he went again, round & round the ceiling until he eventually descended & landed on the back of the chair behind me.  I managed to scoop him up.  He was okay but it really was not one of his best ideas…