Flipping the bird

For the first few days, the parakeet didn’t seem to want to eat much. I made him a high protein mix of boiled egg and shredded carrot. It seemed odd to be feeding eggs to a bird, but he seemed to like it well enough. His appetite began to recover, and he now seems to be eating normally.

He got his first visit to the vet the other day. Apparently most budgerigars are little bastards as far as letting vets handle them, but ours is very well behaved. He still nips a little, but he’s pretty gentle.

Unfortunately it turned out that the poor dear had picked up some kind of sinus infection, so now we have to administer antibiotics for just over a week. The best approach seems to be to catch him in a soft cloth, then flip him over and offer the syringe. He will peck at it, at which point you can squirt the liquid into his beak.

It’s most easily accomplished with two people. This morning my first attempt to flip him over failed, he escaped the cloth, and then he promptly ran under the sofa to hide. I suppose I wasn’t gripping tightly enough, but the last thing I want to do is hurt him. It’s bad enough having to maul him like this twice a day anyway, he’s going to hate us by the end of next week.