Sparks is home and Doll is better
Sparks, the latest addition to my foster pigeon flock, was very sick when I brought him home from the shelter a week ago Wednesday night. He was fluffed, depressed, barely eating and had two wounds. I've learned from experience that feathers hide a lot so, when I check over a new pigeon, I look them over carefully. I found the torn skin around his leg and the angry looking scab on his back but when the vet checked him over, she pulled that scab right off to reveal a puncture wound I could have almost fit my finger in. That's the dif between a civilian and a pro. From the looks of the wounds, I think a dog got a hold of Sparks. It's pretty amazing that he got away. Also amazing, is that, after a week of antibiotics, debriding, wound care and surgery to close the wounds up, he's now doing great. He went into the vet weighing 458g (skinny) and came home yesterday weighing 529g (up 15%) and is eating voraciously. He's full of piss & vinegar now, much more spirit and personality. He's still in a hospital cage (not tank) and on antibiotics but I'm not worried about him anymore. I think Sparks is going to be a strong pij.
In the hospital cage next door, Doll is doing well. I hate the chunk that was taken out of her beak but it looks, to my eyes, to be healing and she is eating lots and showing no signs of infection. She definitely does NOT like to be caged up. That's probably a sign of her good health more than personality, though. The birds I cage are usually very ill or recovering from being ill and being so compromised, they just tolerate it. I got Doll when she was young (probably only a month old, still such a "squeaker" that I had to segregate her from the grown-up birds) and she's had a relatively safe, healthy, happy life and has been a picture of good health. She'd often fly in place and do a little kick-up-her-heels-flying-leapfrogging kind of thing, showing off her vitality. I hope I can get her out of the cage and back to her antics soon.
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home