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:cry: Poor little doves


darkfur

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I got 4 ringneck doves from the local poultry/pigeon show 2 weeks ago to live in my aviary with my other 4, and 3 of the new ones have died on me :cry:

Vet is trying to figure out what happened but it looks like they were really malnourished before I got them and the stress of the move and the bad weather was too much for them. One of them I found in a coma and tried to save her with the vets help with syringe feeding and a heatpack but she only perked up for a few hours. I weighed her after she died and she weighed only 98g, compared to a couple of mine I weighed which were 209g and 207g. The last one surviving of the new ones is 170g and I think he will be ok. They were only $5 birds but its been so horrible and the vet bills will be monstrous because they have had to send samples to Massey for postmortem to make sure there is nothing infectious for my other birds to catch. I honestly think they must have been really run down before I got them because a bird can't lose half its body weight in 2 weeks (unless you didn't feed it AT ALL). Do you guys think I would be justified in going after the seller for a refund and the vet costs?

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sorry about your loss :(

however you may be successful in recovering the cost of the birds back - if the seller is nice and understanding - there is usually no obligation for private sellers to provide a guarantee for sold livestock but any guarantee would be based on the purchase price of the animal i would think. best to ask a legal expert. you would have to prove that the birds were in poor health and were in an unfit to sell condition at the time of purchase.

Recovering vet bills however will not be possible.

edit- PS- different story when dealing with commercial sellers.

2. - is it worth your time?

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mmm I don't know how the law works with livestock. If it was a normal consumer purchase the vet bills would count as consequential loss and they would be obliged to cover it. I think that it shouldn't be too hard to prove the doves were sick if i have the opinion of Massey and my own vet. I just don't want every other bird in my household dying if they have something transmissible.

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a birds breastbone should be like a tegel chicken, lots of meat either side

if it is like a yatch keel do not purchase

sress is the biggest killer of birds, they use up their vitamin b's and go into paralysis

remember birds have a high metabolism and can go from being well to dead in as little as 4 hours

barbary doves are pretty tough usually

sorry you had to go through this, but a lesson may have been learnt for the future

like fish you should try a quarantine period

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made the mistake of letting the reps at the bird show do all the handling when buying them, I'm sure I would have noticed the skinniness had I handled them. It's not that obvious to the eye since they are pretty fluffy birds. LOL at Tegel chicken, I know what you mean since I have plenty of other birds but if they were like a Tegel I'd be worried there were steroids in their food. Commercial chickens are weird.

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almost definatly either coxsideous (I know the spelling is wrong on that one) or Canker

Canker is treated with sulpher based drugs and coxy is a dirty condition thing that allows the pathogens to take over.

When pigeons/doves go light and wont respond to treatment, often if you pull out all the tail feathers, they will slowly come right.... sounds like an old wives tail but it works.

with all due respect to vets here in NZ, very few know anything about pigeons so most treatments that work are what we (as pigeon racers) have found that works over seas.

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thanks Barrie :)

I didn't especially think it was coccidiocis since they had no diarrhoea or vomiting, and they didn't have any signs of canker either, but they will be tested for both because I don't want my remaining doves or pigeons getting sick.

Agree with the lack of knowledge in NZ - I use the Rob Marshall book for my homing pigeons.

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thanks Barrie :)

I didn't especially think it was coccidiocis since they had no diarrhoea or vomiting, and they didn't have any signs of canker either, but they will be tested for both because I don't want my remaining doves or pigeons getting sick.

Agree with the lack of knowledge in NZ - I use the Rob Marshall book for my homing pigeons.

I gave my books (including Rob Marshals) to a vet in Titirangi

He also had a nice range or treatments

Coci dosnt always have the externaly systems like diarhoea but they simply go light...we call it going light

If it happens again, try the tail feather trick as I thing you will be supprised

BTY, we still have 60 to 80 pure white birds

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