Abstract
Items to Help Your Babies at Home
Due to the recent increase in the new ownership of available handfed babies and the improved success that bird owners are enjoying in breeding their own birds, our pediatric medicine selection has enlarged at a tremendous rate. Unfortunately, not all of the questions or requests for assistance we receive are happy ones, and many of the problems incurred are a result of improper equipment or insufficient information to properly raise these little fellows. Other situations in the area of pediatric health support are due to true medical conditions which are unpredictable and, in some cases, poorly understood at this time. The fact stands though that probably a great majority of the health concerns discovered by bird owners are preventable, given the right tools and supplies.
This presentation is to help you better prepare for this coming spring's challenges. These recommendations are merely that. They have all been highly successful for myself and my clients but the statement of '' A fact merely marks the point where we have agreed to let our investigations cease" probably does not apply to everything covered here. We all should continue to strive for new ways of improving the quality of life for our birds and thereby the quality of our own lives.
I. Equipment and Supplies
These items are inexpensive and contribute a great deal toward your bird's comfort and your personal time savings. These items are available through a local bird shop, hardware outlet or one of the major advertisers in the bird magazines. These products have been time tested on thousands of patients and healthy individuals alike.
Thermometers: This is a simple item, frequently overlooked and impossible to duplicate using the human body. Thermometers have two very important uses in a nursery. First as a guide for incubator temperatures, whether it is for eggs or for a chick brooder. Overheating eggs will cause embryonic death and/or the premature hatching of weak chicks with a high risk of dehydrated egg membranes and the accompanying sticking, which can be a cause of fetal hemorrhaging. Overheated babies also dehydrate and are being subjected to a constant and extreme form of stress.
Temperatures lower than ideal will subject chicks to chilling, which frequently leads to respiratory disease and/or other stress related infectious disease. Cold chicks also tend to not digest their food properly as the chilled gut does not propel the food through the body at a normal rate (decreased peristalsis). Chilled eggs tend to expire very quickly, as they produce no heat source of their own.
The second strategic use of thermometers is for baby formula preparation. Cold food leads to the same result as cold chicks. Food fed too hot (over approximately 108°F) tends to exceed the body tissue temperatures, which causes the crop, esophagus and oral tissues to sustain thermal bums. The end result can be the classic "crop burn" condition which frequently requires surgical repair. Burns of sufficient severity can be fatal.
Baby formula should be fed between 100°F to 105°F. Food offered below 96°F will be refused, and formula over 108°F is dangerously hot. Give yourself a buffer zone on each end for an unexpected delay in feeding time or a faulty thermometer. Aquarium, cooking or lab type thermometers are a good choice. High quality thermometers may cost a few dollars more but are worth their weight in babies.
House type (outdoor) thermometers inside the brooder work well for babies. More sophisticated laboratory thermometers should be used for the more delicate demands of egg incubators. Saving a few dollars by purchasing a cheap device can cause the loss of hundreds or thousands of birds at some point in the future if a thermometer fails in its accuracy.