Old Zebra ..... Off

[flrancho]

I have two Zebra finches that are both around 5 years old (from time of purchase, I don't know when they hatched). Anyway, one of them, Ivan, is very .... off.

Firstly he appears to have what I would describe as cataracts and its fairly obvious in watching him that he doesn't appear to see well. He usually doesn't fly, even though nothing seems wrong with either of his wings. When he flies, its usually only few inches off the ground. He seems weak in flying. His vent is dirty, and never was in the past. His feathers aren't as shiny and they kind of have that "ratty old bird" look to them. His beak has a tendency to be overgrown and scissor so that we need to trim his beak fairly regularly. When handled, its almost like he "vibrates". Its the weirdest sensation ever.... none of my other birds do that, and he didn't used to either. Its like he's raspy and I wonder if he has a lung problem or heart problem or something that is causing the "vibration" that I'm feeling when I hold him. Lastly, he almost seems senile. I don't know if birds can actually get this or not, but a lot of the time he seems really not be all there or forgets that there's a perch near his food that he can fly up on. He's been up there before, but instead he stands on the cage floor and pecks at the seed cup and wandering around like he doesn't know how to get to his seed despite him being on the perch the day before and getting seed just fine.

Do you all think this is just "old bird problems", or do you think it could be something else? He's been in the hospital cage for a long time, and during the course of time has had some other birds visit him due to injury or whatever, so I know he's not contageous.

Yesterday, we did remove him from the hospital cage to a breeding cage (no we are not intending to breed him). We placed his buddy, the other male Zebra, in there with him. The other Zebra, though purchased at the same time as Ivan, does not have the old bird look, is very active unlike Ivan, but in a freak accident lost two toes on one of his feet. They get along fine and we wanted to make the hospital cage a true hospital cage again instead of it being the place we keep Ivan so he knows where all the food and water is and so the other birds don't pick on him. Prior to us removing him, one of our birds was picking on Ivan so much we feared he was going to kill him. I was hesitant to disorientate Ivan by putting him in a new, bigger cage, but my Mom insisted on doing it anyway. Surprisingly Cagney, the other Zebra, actually seems to be helping him figure out where things are.

Any other ideas?

[Anne73]

Sorry to hear of your zebra finches poor health. I have two that are at least 8+ years old and still going strong, so I don't think this would be old age yet. They both lost their siblings at younger ages though. Hopefully someone with experience on bird illness may be able to help you. Someone recently listed a post with a link to the www.auspigeonco.com and there is an article on common canary and finch diseases with symptoms and treatment. Hopefully that may help you out.