How To Stop Bleeding Cockatiels

WOW, what an eventful afternoon. One of our young cockatiels called ‘Zac’ somehow injured his front left claw and it was bleeding profusely…

A Normal Sunday Afternoon

We had the three young cockatiels and their parents out. They are free to fly around the home and land safely as they please. We always are in the room with them and when they fly make sure that they land ok. Especially as they are young and still experiencing flying and landing, also getting used to the surroundings and the different sounds of the day.

Our cockatiels are often on our heads and shoulders. Nika put her hand up for little ‘Zac’ to jump on…then she noticed blood on her hand.

Bleeding…

‘Zac’ was bleeding from his claw, at first I thought from his beak as he had blood all over his beak, but that was from just trying o clean the area. Even now, we still don’t know why or how it happened, bizarre…

In a mad rush I ran to the freezer to get the bird flour which we always keep for emergencies… We grabbed the little boy and put his feet into the flour. This should help clog up the wound. At first it did, but as soon as he was back in the cage it started dropping blood again. In the panic mode that we were both in, we managed to get the others into the cage. We took ‘Zac’ and floured his feet again.

For a minuite or two it was working, but as soon as he climbed in the cage it started to bleed. We tried to use one of those styptic buds from our first aid box, but that didn’t work and the more we tried the more young ‘Zac’ fought.

The Vet…

I rang the nearest vet…it is Sunday and only a few are open, it pays to know all of this information and have it handy. Situations like this always happen on Sunday’s. This must be the third or fourth time now that we’ve had to visit a vet on a Sunday. Anyway we get to the vet and by the time we got their, ‘Zac’ had stopped bleeding.

A good thing in hindsight as the vet didn’t even know what type of bird it was!!! Maybe he was only trained in cat & dog veterinary situations, who knows, but I was not going to let him do anything. I think we knew more about what to do… He did phone the avian vet and she said to keep him calm as not much more can be done.

Bloody Sunday Drivers… 

Pardon the pun, bloody Sunday drivers…(it exactly was). I think that the drive in the car did him good, as he held on and didn’t climb or try and clean his claws with the motion. So we took him back out and drove off. As soon as we turned the corner he scratched it and the bleeding started. We pulled over and put him into the flour once again. Thank god for flour… We drove home and took him indoors…bad move. The calls from the family only stirred him up and he climbed all over the cage ripping open his wound…

We moved him into another more comfortable cage and took him back out into the car. We spent the next few hours driving slowly through the neighbourhood. The motion was probably the best thing for him. He kept calm and held on.

The Things We Do…

I am writing this sat in the car outside our home… I will wait until dark and the other birds are tucked away ready for the night before we head indoors. Just so that he can stay calm. He hasn’t bleed for the past three hours and is nice and settled. I have a cup of hot tea, so we are set for a while.

It is a very distressful experience when anything like this happens. You think that you are prepared, but you never know what might come at you next. I will stay with young ‘Zac’ as long as needed for him to stay calm and make sure that he doesn’t start to bleed again.

Tags: about cockatiels, bleeding cockatiel, caring for cockatiels, cockatiel care, cockatiels in a home, how to stop bleeding, injured cockatiel