Zebra Finch has blood on/around vent

[Sir Bubbles]

I woke up today to find my female zebra Sophie with dried blood all around her vent. The first thing I did was inspect the aviary for any signs of a bloody egg or bloody droppings, but I didn't notice anything at all aside from one whole ( not damaged or broken ) egg with a very small amount of blood on it in her nest; she was probably sitting on it afterwards.

She is acting 100% herself - eating, drinking, flying around, so that must be good at least. Still, I am worried about her. I have no idea what the problem is but some quick searches online point towards the possibility of difficulty passing an egg and/or internal bleeding. For now I am keeping an eye on her since it's all I can do really. If she bleeds again I will take her to the vet, but for now it looks like it's only dry blood from earlier.

It's difficult to get a good look at her vent since she always flies around and catching them is out of the question for me during the daytime. From what I can see ( not a lot ) I don't notice any immediate damage like prolapsing or what have you, there's just a ton of dried blood.

Has this happened to anyone before? Any idea what the cause is? If this has happened to you, how did you treat your bird?

I appreciate any help!

[wildbird]

Be sure she has lots of fresh water to help replace the blood she lost. Also, you probably already know to provide egg food, cuttle bone, oyster shell for calcium, even some crushed egg shells. Keep her comfortably warm, with an area to get away from the heat. Others with breeding experience are sure to answer this post soon.

[cindy]

red blood indicate bleeding low in the gi tract, darker black blood means there is bleeding higher up in the digestive system

is there blood in her droppings?

[Sir Bubbles]

She has all of her necessary dietary needs plus plenty of water, so those bases are covered.

The blood for the most part was dried red with a few tiny specks of dark/black around her vent. I haven't seen any blood anywhere else, including her droppings. That being said, I haven't seen her poop with my own eyes since I discovered the blood, but I've been watching the floor and other areas closely, and I haven't seen any blood at all.

[Derk]

Sir Bubbles
Cindy knows much more than I but if she did not have the egg prior to seeing the blood it does seem suspicious. Has she laid eggs before? Has she been laying a lot recently? Does the egg look larger than 'normal?'

[Sir Bubbles]

She has laid eggs before, but from what I can tell not a whole lot recently. I inspected her nest ( she shares it with one other Zebra Finch ) and there were only 3 eggs in there today. I'm not an egg expert, I just observe the behavior of my own birds, but this did seem a bit low. The last time I had looked in their nest ( a couple months ago ) there were about 8 or so in there. I notice that they tend to push them out on to the ground and eat them, so I really couldn't give you a concrete number on how many they lay in a day or week.

Furthermore I wouldn't really know whose eggs are who and when they are being laid, all I know is that they come and go. The size of the eggs have also been extremely consistent for all birds.

[cindy]

If this happens again and you do see spots of blood on the liner of the tray or in her droppings please post a picture of the droppings and her vent area.

Do any of the droppings look yellow and soft, mushy, runny? Any undigested seed in her droppings?

[Sir Bubbles]

Hey everyone, just wanted to check in and say that she seems to be doing okay still. No signs of anymore bleeding and still no blood in her poop either from what I can tell. She's still acting herself and appears to have cleaned up her bottom a bit, although it's still reddish from the stains.

Cindy - it's hard for me to tell whose droppings belong to who because she shares an aviary with two other zebras I try to watch and wait for it to happen but I'm not always so lucky. I'll keep an eye out though and let you know how they look.

I'll try to get a picture of her tomorrow but I can't make any promises. They move around a lot and it's hard to get a decent pic through the grating of the cage.

[MiaCarter]

Is she messing with the area, like nipping at it?

I saw this once and the bird in question had a yeast infection. She was on antibiotics at the time.

Photos:
http://www.petfinchfacts.com/all-posts/ ... -in-there/

She was also laying an egg at the time, but in my bird's case, it was just coincidental and it was very clearly not internal blood. It was very obviously external and I saw her nipping at her vent area and the bleeding coincided with this. Upon close inspection you could actually see the little nip marks, so my guess was that she was irritated by the yeast and perhaps it was itchy as yeast can often be.

They also have some very large feathers in that area, with a fairly significant blood supply when they're moulting and growing in new feathers. Is she moulting? Is it possible she broke a blood feather in the tail and it ran down to the vent area and surrounding feathers?

I would give her a heat lamp if you haven't already. That can be very helpful in reducing stress and restoring her strength.

[cindy]

Blood in the droppings can be coccidian, yeast is usually secondary since it usually takes hold as the body is weakened by another disease. Have you removed the hen, held her, looked and felt the breast bone to see if she is thin, the breast bone/keel being prominent and sharp... is there a lack of breast meat on the bird... the abdomen you can photograph like the picture below.. wet the feathers back to view. I can pass the pictures onto someone to view. Look for signs of white, yellow, lumps bumps in the abdomen.

If one bird has it in the aviary/cage has say coccidia, parasites, protozoa, trichomonas you would assume they all have it and you would treat the whole flock that are in with the bird. Coccidia gets into the gut lining and can cause blood either higher up or lower to be present in droppings. It can be constant or intermittent. Best to rule all things out before closing the book on fresh blood around the vent.

You can post random up close pictures of droppings on this topic. Droppings can tell a lot as to what is going on. If any of the droppings look more white or like they have a slimy covering to them, yellow, mushy or runny or undigested seed in it then the birds need to be treated according to their symptoms. Birds fussing with their vents can indicate some possible internal issues one being damage to the cloaca after an egg has been laid.

Since yours are in a flock situation do you do any preventative treatments or were these done prior to new birds being added to the flock?

I do a two day course of organic ACV weekly to keep yeast in check, yeast, parasites and protozoa do not like acid type of environments... this is done after quarantine and preventatives are done. Quarantine lasts 60 to 90 days depending on the source the birds came from. a good one to follow.... http://www.gouldiansgalore.com/quaranti ... ocols.html the only thing I do differently is an extra dose of either Scatt or Ivermectin 1% to the back of the neck 2 weeks after the second dose.

[cindy]

pull the tray out if you can and take a picture of the droppings, use white paper or paper towels under them. Ig the grate does not use white paper or paper towels on top of the grate to get samples.

[cindy]

Also... (mentioned above, red blood can come from the lower GI tract) if she is eating the infertile eggs, shell and all a small fragment of the shell can possible tear or irritate the bowel as it is being passed, if this happened lower down it could explain the blood around the vent. Egg shell is jagged and sharp, small pieces can irritate or possibly cut as passed.

We had a young fledgling that was being fed egg food that had crushed egg shell in the egg food. The fragment got caught in the lower GI tract. It caused red blood in the droppings and the vent area. The baby passed away and our daughter, a vet tech for our avian vet took the bird and x-rayed it... the fragment could be seen on the film in the lower intestine of the bird. (I have since stopped feeding crushed shell to parent birds feeding young, it is powdered then added to the egg food)

[cindy]

Do you have Ronex 12% (if you have 6% then double the powder to one part water). You can ACV (organic apple cider vinegar) to the mix. The amount for ACV is 2 tbsp to 1 gallon. It can be either protozoa or parasite which weakens the system and let yeast take hold.

Both ronex 12% and ACV are safe to give.

[Derk]

cindy
That is excellent info to know about the egg shells and young birds. Thank-you!