What do i do?

[debbie276]

They look pretty good considering what they've gone through. It could be the picture but the one you say that is doing the worst, it looks like the knee is swollen, could there be an infection going on? Maybe rub some sort of antibiotic cream on it like neosporin?
Best of luck

[Ursula]

I was following your story, I hope they all will be doing ok, with 2 legs or just one!

I never had that situation so I don't have any advice, however I noticed that the first 2 have their legs hurt on the side where they wear they leg bands. Could it be that the bands were actually part of the problem and that's why they got tangled up with their feet?? (I know that doesn't help you now, but maybe that's something to look for in future.)

[CandoAviary]

If they are perching fine I would quit taping the legs. The feet will fall off on their own. Anywhere from a few days to a few weeks. Once the leg is dry and brittle it will just snap off on one of the bird's landings. Their are no live nerves so no pain seems to be felt. I have 2 that are housed together...one a blue hen and one an OH green back male. They have the leg to just the top of the knee. They look like little pirates... I have recently placed a nest in the cage with these two... I bet they reproduce They seem to be so very happy together. I must get a picture of them.
Both of mine lost the use from becoming caught in the cage bars about six months apart from each other. Just this past week I found a beautiful male hanging from the top of the cage...He was alive though very thirsty. I freed him and offered drink...boy he just sat in my hand and drank more water than I thought possible at one time. He is doing well though the leg is turning black... He has a hen and 5 chicks in the nest. He is right back to feeding them with his one leg. These birds are amazingly strong and adapting birds.

[BaceyBoop]

well looks like these three are now going to be added to my keepers. don't think i would be able to sell them "half off." bad jokes aside, they're doing really well. the one that was staying on the floor has even spent most of his day on a perch!

I have 2 that are housed together...one a blue hen and one an OH green back male. They have the leg to just the top of the knee. They look like little pirates... I have recently placed a nest in the cage with these two... I bet they reproduce They seem to be so very happy together. I must get a picture of them.

it's good that they have each other and i look forward to pictures! i we always look forward to news of little ones! i assume it's not too difficult for a one legged female to breed. i wonder, though, how a male will handle breeding with one leg? guess only time will tell!

[debbie276]

Breeding for birds take a split second so I don't see it would be too hard.

[PrettyBird]

If they are perching fine I would quit taping the legs. The feet will fall off on their own. Anywhere from a few days to a few weeks. Once the leg is dry and brittle it will just snap off on one of the bird's landings. Their are no live nerves so no pain seems to be felt.

ugh I dont think I would be able to handle seeing that. I think I would become very naseous lol. I would just take them to an avian vet and get them to remove the leg for me, so I dont have to pick up the dead legs off the bottom of the cage. *shudders*

Other than the legs, its good to see the little ones are doing well.
As for breeding with one leg, it can be done!
I know of a male green singer who has both legs amputated and lives on the bottom of the cage, and had no trouble attracting a female and mating with her! she just flew down to the bottom, and he did the rest ;)

[BaceyBoop]

I know of a male green singer who has both legs amputated and lives on the bottom of the cage, and had no trouble attracting a female and mating with her! she just flew down to the bottom, and he did the rest ;)

dirty!

[BaceyBoop]

[BaceyBoop]

i know the post is a few months old, but i thought i'd share an udpate on these little guys. unfortunatly, the baby with the infected leg ended up dying the other 2, however, have grown up big and strong! they're both males. one is red headed and the other is orange headed. the red headed boy is almost fully colored out, while the orange headed one only has a few flecks of color in his face. they are both very happy and healthy and they sing up a storm! and to look at them, you can't even really tell that they're missing legs!

[CandoAviary]

Sorry about the one but these guys are real troopers. I have a few one leggers.. I call it the pirate flight

[lovemyfinch]

They are looking really good.
So so sorry about the other little one

My toughest bird is my little Champ. He has no toes on 1 leg and only 1 on the other. When I rehomed all of my zebbies he stayed with me He is now about 2 years old and living with my shaftails, and just to show you that he is the boss...well when the eggfood gets put down in the morning he is the first in the dish

[CaliforniaZebraFinch]

I have a similar situation....

My female's foot got severely tangled in a fine string. I have no idea how it got there and it still gets me upset that I did not notice sooner! When I seen two of her toes turning black (most likely due to cut off circulation), that's when I removed the fine string but sadly, it was too late. Both toes ended up falling off. But still, she is as crazy as ever and I am glad she is healthy. Now I'm just more cautious of things like that happening.

I'm just wondering if it's still okay for her to breed? Will it be successful?

[kenny66]

look ,you did a really great job with the best possible treatment. Withered legs will eventually shrivel up themselves if the damage is terminal but dont do anything with the feet at this stage. Birds have a remarkable ability to cope with adversity. You never know with nesting material though. For the first time ever I had a gouldian cock with a swollen foot but i couldnt work out what the problem was. When I caught him up he had one strand of cocoanut fibre completey wrapped around his foot. He is now fine but I thought cocoanut fibre was the safest thing of all nesting material. live and learn i suppose

[moonrise]

Something similar happened to one of my society finches awhile back. I had a couple of canary nests (the ones that look like plastic bowls) in their cage, and had purchased felt liners from an online bird supply shop. The liners were made for that purpose.

One evening I went to my bird room to feed and water them, and I was shocked to find one of the societies dangling upside down. He'd somehow gotten his foot embedded in the felt and had tried to fly away, pulling the felt out with him. The felt got tangled up in one of the tree limb perches, and he was just dangling there, not moving.

Thankfully he was still alive; just exhausted from struggling.

His foot and leg were so badly tangled that it took both me and my husband working together to free him. It was embedded almost all the way to his body!

We finally got him loose, and he was fine after getting some rest, but I was so surprised that a meant-for-birds product would've been fatal if I hadn't found him in time.

I make my own liners now out of regular craft felt, and haven't had any problems with them.

I also had a bird get his foot tangled in storebought nesting materials once. The bird was acting strangely, but I couldn't immediately see anything wrong. Upon closer inspection, I noticed that his foot was discolored, and that the circulation was being cut off by a thread-thin fiber. That was a job ... cutting the fiber without cutting his foot ... but it had to come off. After a couple of weeks, he healed up just fine. Whew.

No matter how carefully we keep an eye on things, it's so easy for stuff like this to happen!

[6finchfriends]

I'm so glad this turned out well despite losing the one fledgling. They colored up beautifully!