FINCHforum

Hello
I recently took my 3yr old male zebra finch(chester) to the vet regarding a large growth under his wing. The doctor tried popping the growth but could not. The answer he gave was that it was a non-contagious growh that was common in finches. He said it causes no pain, and that it will keep growing. He refused to remove the growth in fear that his blood would not clot during surgery.
Considering the finch showed no visible signs of pain I took him back home to be with his mate and newborn baby chick. After a while chester's feathers started growing from the growth in a crimped-like fashion.Eventually they fell off and will not grow back. Now poor ol' chester has also lost feathers on his back that will not grow back. The pores in this area look dry and are yellow. He still eats and drinks but is no longer active. He just sits puffed up with his head tucked intowards his growth.
I know for a fact that the others are not plucking.
I dont have any avain specialist in my province so i was wondering if anyone out there may know what i'm dealing with. Yes he shows signs of an ilness but I would hate to euthanize the little guy knowing there could be a possible remedie for his rather strange symptoms.
Any advice???

Oh dear, that sounds really serious, I wish I could help you there but I hope that by replying to the post and bumping it to the top that someone might notice the post.

It sounds like the vet can't be bothered with Chester or doesn't have much experience with birds, are there really no alternative vets you can go to?

update: Chester can no longer fly, he can only bounce around. I do have a hospital cage but it would break his heart if i were to seperate him from his buddies. So I made accomodations so that all the perches and food are low so that he can sleep with his buddies like he do every night and gain access to his necessities.
In regards to the vet,he does treat birds but I have doubt in his expertise comming from a small province it's unlikely that he practices on birds often. I appreciate your response.........In your opinion if a bird could no longer fly, do you think it would do him justice to euthanize him? I'm running out of options.......but still holding on to some hope........If only birds could talk!

At 3 years old and sounding like he is in a serious condition and deteriorating, I would probably do the humane thing. Finches are masters at hiding pain, they will look ok until it gets too late, meanwhile suffering through it.

Last gasp effort to help Chester back to health would be suppling him with some electrolytes and maybe antibiotics. For the electrolytes try using a product called Thrive, I seen this mentioned in a previous thread. For the antibiotics I used a single drop administered directly into the mouth when one of my Javas was sick, it was fine again in 2 days.

Try the last ditch effort first and then if it doesn't work then...well...I don't want to say it.

Good luck and let us know.

Geordie

Update: I came home from work this evening and chester was dead. I feel horrible for allowing him to go on so long....poor guy must have been suffering:( I had a vet apointment for chester tomorrow morning, looks like thats not going to happen. BUt it sure beats him having to be scooped up and put in a car for a 20min drive. It's a blessing that he had a baby male finch that looks just like him:) I will know now in the future that whenever any of my finches symptoms progress they will be treated immediately.

Sorry to hear about Chester. As long as you gave him a good home you can take some solace in that.

Geordie

Sorry for your loss. Keep in mind you gave him 3 great years.

Sean

So sorry for your loss. It's always hard to lose one of our finches.

That's terrible, very sorry that he didn't make it. Good thing you have his baby though!

So sorry for your loss.

Sorry for your loss, I know how hard it can be when a favorite finch passes.

Do you think the growth might have been some type of illness, or maybe something genetic?

Thanks everyone for the kind words. IN regards to the last post, I examined the body and the growth was the size of chic pea! and there were also little areas by the base of the tail that were really rough and dry. I assume it may be a bacterial infection of some sort, I hope it's not genetic........i dont want it happening to the little guy!

I cant wrap my head around this one......I purchased a new male finch today to replace chester. When i brought him home i noticed that he had what looked like a feather plucked. I picked him up and checked his wing.....sure enough he had a growth in the same spot as chester once had:( I notified the pet store and they said he could be returned. For all finch owners: this is common so therefor you should look for growths under the wings and everywhere else for that matter. They are not contagious...but you should consider euthanizing them.....dont make the mistake I made by waiting to long.

Do you think you could take a picture of it?

I seem to be having trouble posting pictures! I will try my best to describe it though.... It's the same color as the finche's skin(pink-ish) with a a wart-like texture(hard).....it is extremely easy to notice once you lift the wings. In both my finches they developed underneath the base of the feather. They look rather abnormal so they cant go unnoticed. I wish I could solve the mystery. The veternarian never gave me a scientific name or anything , he just said that it's fairly common in birds. I hope this helps.