Introducing new birds and cage size?? New FIDS!

[wendyrun]

HI,

Very excited...we returned from the bird show yesterday with a new friend for each of our two boys.
Our zebra male Beaker will hopefully get along with his new black cheeked zebra friend (Bonzo - I think) and our CB male Azul - newly feathered out - will have as his new cage buddy a beautiful owl finch ("Thurston").

So my questions...
Of course the minute we got home I was dying to just put the new birds in with their new friends. However, based on what I've read here, we need at least 3 -4 weeks quarantine with no problems before we do that. I don't have a 4th cage...I have two established homes now for the older boys, but the babies are in small cage that Beaker and Azul lived in when we got them (14x18x12).
since I brought them home together, I put them in that cage, but divided it down the middle.
They didn't come from the same breeder. I did ask both sellers if they were the breeders, and they said yes. I had sense to ask the owl's breeder if he'd been treated for mites, not much else, and by the time I picked the black cheek, I was too dim to remember to ask him much about the health. I was wearing my pug in a pouch on me, it was hot, and I was afraid I was going to get kicked out

Do I need to get another cage for the quarantine period? Or is a small space ok for just a few weeks? Now whatever one bird might have, he's still exposing the other even if not touching (yes I'm a quick thinker). I do have them in a separate room, but the new fids are skittish, and I'm worried they are going to hurt themselves just trying to get away from the giant hands that keep changing out the food and water.

Seems like a lot of people here are comfortable treating for potential illness on their own but I'm way too much of a novice. So I was thinking maybe if I make an appt with the avian vet, let him give them a once over and a clean bill of health, I could move them into the homes with their new friends without the long wait, and not worry about them crashing around a small cage??

Let me add...both boys look wonderfully healthy, they are both vocal (especially Thurston). Thurston is about 9 months, and um, Bonzo, I think the breeder said 6-9 months but I was having trouble hearing in the noise and not 100% sure...

thank you in advance for any advice!!

Wendy

[carcoozie]

Hey Wendy - I am really too new to all of this to give you much advice on the cage sizing and health info, but wanted to see if you were at the St.Aug bird fair yesterday? If so, so was I!

I resisted the urge to get more birds, but I did come away with a much larger cage for my fids. They are happy.

Congrats on the new birds! - do you have pics?

C

[Sally]

Check out the cages for sale by Ghostbuster (in Gainesville) in Marketplace.

[L in Ontario]

Congrats on your new bird buddies! I don't believe an avian vet can honestly give a 'clean bill of health' just by looking at them and without doing some testing (ie bloodwork, etc) and that can be both extremely stressful to a finch and get expensive too.

I'm sorry but I would not take a new finch to a vet. Just keep them in the quarantine cage for 4 weeks. If they look and act fine during all that time - then they can join the other fids after a month.

Personally, since they're in the same cage already but divided - I'd remove the divider and let them have each others' company.

Anyone else have thoughts on this?

[Sally]

I back up what Liz says completely. Unless you have a serious problem with a finch, you are pretty much wasting your money just having them checked over. So many avian vets work with the larger hookbills, but not finches. I did take a little Star finch to an avian vet one time. They commented that it was the first finch they had seen--that should have been my clue to forget it! They were very nice, but of no help whatsoever. I really knew what it probably was from reading on the internet (I had used too hot water in the formula when handfeeding and burned its crop), but was hoping the vet would tell me different. So I spent $45 for the visit alone, fortunately they said they didn't know what to do for it, and so didn't run a bunch of tests, etc. I hate to sound cruel, but some vets will run up a huge bill on a $50 bird.

And yes, I would remove the divider, no point in keeping them separated. I always put birds in quarantine together, unless there would be a compatability problem. Azul and Thurston should make great buddies!

[wendyrun]

Hi Everyone,

Carcoozie, yes, that's where we were!! It was hard to resist getting way more than I planned b/c of the bird selection. I'm sure it was small in comparison to bigger areas, but all I've got here is Petsmart with hardly any birds. We went just after 9am to make sure we got a good selection
I only asked one breeder for pricing on Gouldians and hers were 35.00 each which sounded very low!

Sally and Liz, I'm running home now to take out the divider! I feel so bad for them being all squashed together and not able to interact. Bonzo is quite a bit bigger than Thurston so just going to keep an eye and make sure no plucking happens!!

I got lucky on an avian vet here - the couple who run the practice used to breed Gouldians. But if the protocol is to give the month long treatment for air sac mites without knowing if they have them or not - that was very expensive and stressful for Beaker and Azul. I would rather not spend the money if they are indeed healthy.

PS my hubby would have a cow if I got more cages now..wish I had seen those sooner.

Thanks everyone!!

Wendy

[franny]

Wendy,

If you can get some Scatt, or Ivermectin, or S76 you can do the treatment for ASM yourself, you don't need the vet for that. And now, while they are in quarantine is a good time to do it.

You won't find those meds at the local Petsmart though. You'd have to order online. Lots of places sell it and a small bottle of S76 is not too expensive. Keep it in the fridge and it will last a long time ... and still be effective even after the best before date.

Mind you, the chances of your pair having ASM is slight. It's more common among gouldians and canaries. Pretty rare in other finches, so unless your two were housed with gouldians it's pretty unlikely they'd have picked up Air Sac Mites.

[lovemyfinch]

I am also going to agree 100% with Liz and Sally.

I stopped by the vets when I first started out, wanting to buy scatt or something similar in order to treat my new babies. What I still don't believe to this day, is how little they know about these fine feathered friends. They actually wanted me to bring each one of the birds (stressful beginnings), and then charge 30$ per bird, before prescribing the Scatt. I am so glad that I was able to get it elsewere (thanks Liz), At $30 per bird times 10 birds at the time =$300 plus taxes = $340. With this money I can feed them for a very very long time. In fact what I did was go out and spend the money on more fids.

[ac12]

This is generally what I do for my quarantine procedure
http://www.ladygouldianfinch.com/featur ... antine.mgi

Since I have gouldians, I treat ALL incoming birds (gouldians or not) for ASM.

I've used small cages, all the way down to travel carrier cages. I figure for a month they can deal with the small cage. Plus the small cage makes it easier to catch them if/when I have to.

Yes they do get excited when I stick my hand in to change the food and water. But then, they get excited even in a bigger cage when I stick my hand in the cage. If you can get a small cage that you can change the food and water w/o sticking your hand inside the cage, that will be the best type to use to not get the birds excited.

$35 for a gouldian IS LOW. The cheapest that I've seen here in the San Francisco Bay Area is $55 for a normal RH-PB-green back, and it goes up from there to over $200 for a blue.