Posted: Fri Jul 07, 2006 4:00 pm Post subject: itchy bird with feather loss
hi everyone
i'm new on this website and appologise for my incorrect (or is it creative? ) english as it is not my first language even though i'm living in australia (queensland).
i've bought two red fronted kakarikis two months ago. they are brother and sister and about six months old. the male is continuosly loosing feathers arund/ behind his eyes and around his neck. he is scratching himself very often. apart from that he is very active and happy, destroyes everything that comes near his beak and chats a lot. boths birds have horizontal dark marks/ lines on their tale feathers and the girl is missing parts of her tale feathers as well. i thought it might be mites and sprayed them and their cage several times with 'aristopet bird mite and lice spray' but it didn't help yet. does anyone have any idea or suggestion what it could be and what i could do? does anyone know any natural treatments against mites as i don't like to spray my birds with those chemicals all the time? thanks.
The spray that you have mentioned is a very good product. We use that particular spray on a regular basis as it is a natural product and does not have chemicals in it. It is safe to spray the birds directly and we have found it to be 100% effective against mites. We also spray our nest boxes regularly and it does not harm the chicks.
In order for the spray to have any effect you will need to spray the cage and the perches. Mite has a habit of living in natural timbers and so it could be that your birds are becoming infected from these. If it is mite the spray should work. You will need to spray every 10-12 days so that any mite eggs will also be destroyed once they have hatched.
There are other products you can also try but we have found the spray to work well and because it is completely harmless for the birds I think it is the best option.
Hi Farafino, !
A good product that also lasts longer than the mite spray is Fido Dog wash - I use it to spray the cages after cleaning and it helps keeps the mites away.
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