Vacuum Moulting Birds

[finchandlovebird]

I know you can vacuum cats & dogs (if they allow it) to remove hair. I was cleaning cages yesterday & vacuuming, and I just thought it would be cool if we could vacuum our birds when they are moulting. Please, no flames; I'm just kidding

[Nerien]

Hey, I know--put them in a little chamber with an air intake at one end and the vacuum at the other, and the flow of air through it would pull all the loose feathers off and directly into the vacuum.

Send warm air with the scent of fresh millet, and the little featherheads would be lining up to take their turn!

[Ginene]

Lol!!! You guys are nuts!!!

[wilkifam]

I have a canary breeder friend who always just stuck the vacuum into the cages and vacuumed. Did not seem to bother the birds much, until one day - she accidently sucked a canary into the end of the hose! She shut off the vacuum and retrieved the poor bird from the hose, alive and seeming just fine despite his ordeal.

A couple days later, she went to vacuum again, and when she turned the vacuum on, and he heard the noise, that same poor canary just dropped over dead in his cage.........

[Nerien]

Poor Bird!

My mother used to vacuum our cat, he slept on this one chair and it was so furry and filthy that she started vacuuming around him, and he learned to ignore it. Then one day, she decided to try vacuuming him, and he ignored it, so she'd do that all the time.

Until the day his tail got sucked up the vacuum hose. Not sure who was more alarmed, cat or my mother. After that, as soon as anyone took any part of the vacuum out of the closet, the cat was at the front door begging to go out.

[dcompt]

When I'm cleaning the messy end of the flight, I pull out the tray and run the hose attachment beneath the grate. The birds all keep as much distance as they can between themselves and the black snaky thing, though they don't seem very alarmed by it. But it's a long flight, so they can retreat to a considerable distance. If I ever sucked one in, I would probably be the one keeling over from panic.

[EyesofFreedom]

I was vacuuming out behind my entertainment center and accidentally got my ferret... it was funny in a way seeing her rear flop around as I reached to shut off the vacuum

[Nerien]

Somebody needs to invent some kind of vacuum hose cover that allows dirt to get sucked up, but prevents pets and pet parts from going up the tube. Obviously this is a frequent but unrecognized problem.

[finchandlovebird]

Nerien - just use one of the many available attachments on the hose end

[Nerien]

But they're all still big enough to let a bird or a tail in. the only one that isn't is the crevice tool, which being a smaller opening, makes the suction stronger, risking greater harm to an animal sucked up against it.
Need some kind of diffuser-cover, lets the crud through, but would spread out the pressure a critter would feel if sucked up against it, for a safe and gentle vacuuming experience.

[cindy]

applying a vacuum to a bird is risky to say the least...some vacuums have strong suction that the force could rupture blood vessels and cause swelling not to mention stressing them out...skip the vacuum and let them bathe to help soften and loosen the feathers naturally.

[finchandlovebird]

cindy I was only kidding about vacuuming the birds.

Nerien ... I have several vacuum tools that have really small openings; one is just a pointy tube thing.

[mayble]

What we need to come up with is a low-pressure vacuum hood, like in a chemical lab, to gently pull air (and feathers, dust, seed hulls) up and out.
The ideal cage would have one built in. Along with an automatic litter cleaner, of course!

[finchandlovebird]

mayble I'll buy one of those

[EyesofFreedom]

if you were to tear your vacuum apart and install a rheostat (potentiometer) in the feed to the motor you can slow the motor and thus lower the vacuum suction flow...

take a wide spaced sifter grate and install that inside the tube as a "filter"