FINCHforum

Hello Folks,

I'm in need of some advice with what to do with my sick gouldian.

Here's the story:
4 weeks ago, I received THREE baby blueback gouldians in the mail. 2 are approx. 2 months old, 1 is approx. 4 months old. These are all uncolored gouldian babies. The 4 mo. old's name is 416. The other two are siblings and are named 417 and 418.
416 and 418 came to me in good condition. Nice tight feathers, very active and alert. 417 however, was fluffed and had a wet vent. Not as active but he/she was still alert enough to fly away if I stuck my hand in the cage. For the most part however, fluffed and just lethargic. 417's droppings are wet and yellowish when it lands on the newspaper.
After arriving, I treated them immediately with SCATT. I placed them in with my one original BB gouldian hen. Two-Three days after being placed together, I noticed that my original blueback hen, whom was perfectly healthy beforehand, became lethargic and fluffed. So I quickly started to treat them with Ronivet 12%. Two days after treatment, I took them all to an avian vet. I paid $100 and all he told me was that they were all fine, weight was healthy and they're fluffed up probably due to stress. I asked if he could do fecal exams but he said there's no point because it won't indicate much and the best way to find out if they're sick is if they're dead and we do a necropsy. I found this pretty ridiculous, as the whole point of taking them to the vet to begin with is to SAVE their lives, not to wait for them to die and find out what it was. Wasted $100 but... whatever. By the 5th day of treatment, but original BB hen was in good health again and I continued to finish the 7 days of treatment. 417 however, did perk up a little bit and was doing better than when she/he first arrived. So I took the treatment out, thinking they are all better now. However, 417 is still not as active and healthy as the others looked.
Two weeks pass by and 417 is declining. The wet vent symptom came back. I notice that his/her droppings are very liquid and yellow now. Very lethargic. I started ronivet treatment again two days ago but I don't see any improvement and it's already the third day. The other three birds, 416, 418 and the BB hen is with 417 but they are perfectly healthy, or so it seems.

What do I do now? I ordered Amoxitex just earlier today. Could this be a bacterial infection?

Symptoms:
Lethargy, fluffed feathers, sleeping during the day, Wet vent, watery droppings, yellow droppings.

Any help would be appreciated.

Thank you!

I don't think there's a point in isolating 417 right now, since if whatever 417 has, the others MAY be potential carriers. So if 417 is getting medicated, they're all getting medicated. I didn't know Amoxitex could be mixed with Ronivet though. This wouldn't overload things?

I was actually thinking of stopping Ronivet treatment and just switch to Amoxitex, since I don't think Ronivet is doing anything right now.

I think it would be beneficial to 417 to isolate him in his own cage so that you can monitor his symptoms and progress. It will also allow you to keep him in an extra warm, stress-free, quiet environment. I would call the customer service dept. at Lady Gouldian tomorrow and see what they suggest.

Good luck and I'm sorry you're dealing with a sick bird. Mine is also sick and I am so worried about her.

First I want to say I am by no means an expert on treating with meds.

Yellow droppings can be:
yeast (yellow and normal size)
bacteria
cochlosoma (mustard colored)

Ronivet-S 12% is good formotile protozoa such as Trichomonas, Hexamita, Giardia, and Cochlosoma/canker

Amoxitex would be good for bacteria

I personally would try the amoxitex because you already tried the ronivet

You may want to contact Laraine and see what she would recommend, http://ladygouldian.com/ Her phone number and email is on the web site.

best of luck

Although you are probably already doing this, I didn't see it mentioned and want to suggest you put some heat on these birds. My apologies if you are already doing this - it's just such an important part of dealing with illnesses - actually the very first line of defense.

I can't help otherwise and sincerely hope you are able to find an answer and effect a cure.

That vet was quite a let down. It's unfortunate because without his/her help it's a bit of a guessing game.
My first thought would be cocci. I would try baycox / endocox. Hope they pull through.

I believe cocci (coccidiosis) is a parasite and as the parasite reproduce they cause bleeding and massive swelling of the gut. Listlessness, lethargy, weight loss, blood in the droppings, dark green, tacky, smelly diarrhea, and dehydration are all common signs of Coccidiosis. It mostly occurs when the cage conditions are damp. Prolonged warm, wet conditions help the parasites survive in the aviary and multiply in the bird.
When birds are infected with Coccidiosis, you will need to treat with Trimethaprim Sulfa, http://ladygouldian.com/content/medicat ... occidiosis

Hope you get this figured out. What shocks me the most about your story is that any breeder would ship 2-month-old and 4-month-old uncolored juveniles. The stress of shipping at such an early age probably caused this.

And I would still separate the sick one from the others, have a heat lamp on it, and keep it quiet. A sick bird usually needs to be by itself so that it doesn't have to deal with the other birds.

sorry to hear about your vet visit. I had a visit like that myself with my baby green singer. I would separate the chick and do heat. call Lorraine. hope all goes well. tammy

When birds are infected with Coccidiosis, you will need to treat with Trimethaprim Sulfa

@debbie276 Is Coccicare (from morningbird) not effective in case of coccidiosis? ladygouldian.com says coccicare is preventive measure; and "when birds are already infected with Coccidiosis, you will need to treat with Trimethaprim Sulfa". Whereas MorningBird says "Birds should be treated for 5 to 7 days with coccicare. .... Safe for young and adult birds." They do not mention anything about Trimethaprim Sulfa. I am confused.

Bhatta wrote:

When birds are infected with Coccidiosis, you will need to treat with Trimethaprim Sulfa

@debbie276 Is Coccicare (from morningbird) not effective in case of coccidiosis? ladygouldian.com says coccicare is preventive measure; and "when birds are already infected with Coccidiosis, you will need to treat with Trimethaprim Sulfa". Whereas MorningBird says "Birds should be treated for 5 to 7 days with coccicare. .... Safe for young and adult birds." They do not mention anything about Trimethaprim Sulfa. I am confused.

Cocci-care is not a "treatment" for coccidia, it retards the life cycle but it doesn't destroy the organism. So, it basically puts the disease into remission.

interesting. TMP is an antibiotic and will kill the organism.

coccicare on the other hand contains:

- Amprolium 80 g/L.
- Ethopabate 5.1 g/L.

it seems amprolium is a Vit B1 uptake inhibitor, which will retard the growth and multiplication of the organism. so when giving vit rich foods to a young gouldian, i would assume that it contains lots of vitamins, B included which will now cause the organism to thrive.

ethopabate is a bacteriostatic drug that inhibits the growth of coccidio. it is not- cidal, meaning it wont kill the organism.

thus, antibiotics TMP sulfa would be the best option for a sick gouldian probably infected with coccidio needing energy rich foods to recover including vitamin B.

hope this helps.

Ed


this is what wiki says:
Amprolium is not an organism, so is not an antibiotic in the sense I think you mean. It is an analog of Vitamin B1, and works by preventing the uptake of thiamine (B1) by the organism which causes coccidiosis. Amprolium makes the creature's body an environment hostile to the development of coccidiosis, without actually attacking the coccidiosis organism. It's like a placebo food for the coccidiosis microbe, which gets no nourishment from it. To some degree amprolium also reduces the uptake of thiamine in the creature who is eating amprolium in its feed, so it is only administered until the young chickens are old enough to have built up an immunity to coccidiosis, from low-level environmental exposure to it. Then they are switched to unmedicated feed. (This is fairly common for management of small poultry flocks; I can't speak about the management of large-scale operations.) Using amprolium does not contribute to drug-resistant microbes.

And I'm sorry that your juvie is sick again. Now you have to treat all 4 of them. Wishing for the best.

Thank you everyone. I received an email saying my meds were shipped out today. I am hoping he/she will hang in there. I will update as things go by.

Did you separate the bird and put it under a heat lamp running 24x7?
Even if they are all exposed to whatever it has, the heat will give that specific bird extra help in recovering.