A bath, the travel cage & a raisin

We had a little drama a few days ago.

Part of our morning routine is that I offer Perry the bath with plain water to drink, first thing. Subsequent offerings are usually supplemented water. The first offering is plain water as sometimes Lennie is tempted to have a bath in it & I would rather he did not bathe in expensive vitamin water!

The morning of Tuesday 15th December, Lennie decided it was bath time (fine – as it was plain water!) & unusually, Perry was also inspired to have a bath too. They both had very thorough baths. However, Perry’s bath meant that the area around his lump was wet & exposed & revealed a black lump. To say I was horrified would be an understatement!

A part of me thought that Perry must be okay as otherwise he would not have had the energy to have a bath. But a black lump? There was no way I could put a positive spin on that.

Perry was a bit quiet after his bath but it was a very vigorous one so it made sense he had worn himself out a bit. He perked up a bit later & ate & drank. By then, I had already booked a visit to the vet for that evening. Our usual mobile vet was not available so we actually had to visit the local vet ourselves, resulting in Perry having a short stay in the travel cage.

Though the local vet is only a few streets away, this particular evening the main road was unexpectedly closed which meant the traffic was diverted into the side streets that would normally have been quiet (& my preferred route). Perry’s travel cage was well padded & I threw an extra fleece over it for added warmth & protection. I walked as quickly as possible but the noise of traffic, from beeping horns & revving engines was very unpleasant & I feared for Perry’s stress levels.

On arrival at the vet’s practice, I quickly peeked inside to check he was okay (I had heard him fall off the perch) & he was clinging to the side. On unveiling him to the vet, I quickly noticed that part of his lump was on the cage floor!

It turned out that 0.7cm of his lump had developed into dead tissue & his moving around the travel cage had dislodged it. It was a clean break. The vet examined Perry & said the remaining 2cm of lump looked stable. It looked round & not misshapen (apparently a good thing). She thought he looked in otherwise good condition, with bright eyes & good quality feathers. He is overweight at around 60g, part of that will be the remaining lump & obviously a result of less exercise due to reducing mobility. No treatment necessary.

It was such a relief to get him home. Lennie was also happy to have his mate back.

For the record, I did take a photo of the piece of lump that fell off but not until a couple of days later when it had shrivelled somewhat & looked like a raisin… I will spare you all that vision.