flight feathers

[hill]

Hello from a snowy cold skegness:( having a few problems with busters flight feathers about 16 weeks ago when we first got buster he fell from his cage and broke all of his flight feathers on his left wing. Well over the past few weeks they have been coming back but they keep snapping and he is pulling them to. Due to this he is not letting them grow all the way down is this a problem or will they grew back plus i think he is starting his molt to.

[ecodweeb]

Dave is the best for advice on this subject. I believe the correct course of action would be to ensure the broken quills are pulled from the wing so that they can fully regenerate.

[Luvparrots]

Sorry to hear that your grey is having flight feather problems. I hope someone with experience with this will be along to give you some advice. Dave007 in the Health Room is a good one to ask about this.

[Dave007]

Of all feathers that get injured, the flight and tail feathers give the most trouble. Many different after effects can happen. Most of the time, those two different areas that have injured feathers will take the longest to get back to normal. What your is doing isn't unusual especially if they is constant irritation going on. Flight feathers, when broken aren't usually laying on the rest of the feathers in the proper way causing a bird to constantly bite at them. This is especially true if only one side was affected. Losing those feathers during a molt is the closest natural thing that can happen but those two sets of damaged feathers don't all fall out at the same time. When a bird is naturally molting, even birds that have no damage, the flight and tail feathers won't all fall out at the same time. Flight and tail feathers aren't part of the once or twice a year molt that birds go through. Most of the time during a molt the flight and tail feathers will still be there. All flight and tail feathers only fall out when they're dead which means that the blood no longer is in those feathers at any part of the year. 1 or 2 or 3 at at a time. So, pulling, cracking, plucking, biting at those remaining damaged feathers isn't unusual and they can be removed by a vet at the base of each feather or they can eventually fall out. They will eventually grow back but it'll be uneven and more than likely will take a long time. If you choose not to have them removed, about the only thing you can do is to put aloe vera gel on the body where the shaft is coming out of the skin. That'll ease the irritation caused by those shafts being bent.

 

If your bird has broken feathers sticking out but not bleeding at the point of the crack/break, the feather above the crack/break can be snipped off. the snipping can only be done above the crack. That only pertains to the feather that remains long but broken and isn't bleeding. Irritation caused by broken flight feathers can be corrected by a vet or you can do it the long way which is the method above. You should expect more biting if the long method is used. It's a matter of when the feathers come in all at once and no one can predict when that'll happen since they all fall out unevenly. That also applies to tail feathers but to a lesser degree.

[Luvparrots]

Thanks for the information Dr. Flock. :kiss: