how can i stop my african gray parrot from picking himself till he bleeds ?

Answer 1

You have to put a collar on him.

Seriously,

this is a syndrome that caged birds get.

Answer 2

You need to take your grey to a Certified Avian Veterinarian and have a complete exam preformed. Plucking can be caused by medical and psychological reasons and only a vet can determine the cause and the recommend treatment. The longer the plucking continues, the more difficult to stop.

Also, make sure that your grey has full spectrum lighting and gets regular baths in the mean time. Offer him something to shred instead of plucking his feathers.....unbleached adding machine paper hung in his cage may temporarily get his attention off of his plucking. Still.....a visit to the vet is your best bet.

Answer 3

I have an african gray that sometimes plucks his feathers when I do not pay him attention. When I notice that he is doing this then I keep him with me as much as possible ie... take him for walks on my arm, take him for a ride in my jeep, take him into the shower with me. I sometimes just sit and talk to him, or teach him a new rhyme or song. If he is sitting in a room all by himself then he is lonely ( they are very social creatures) so move him to where the action is.

Overall, relax. and pay your bird some attention.

Answer 4

How long has he been doing it...did he just recently start. What kind of diet is he on. There are always several factors that contribute to birds plucking. You first need to take him to the vet and have a blood panel done on him..make sure there isn't any problems there. A lot of times it diet related.
Take him to the vet..now please.
A collar isn't going to keep him from plucking...it's just a band aide for the underlying problem. There are reasons parrots pluck..it's not just something that "caged birds do". They do it because there is something drastically wrong that needs to be fixed.

Answer 5

This girl down the street had one, he pulled all his feathers out he could reach and then would pick until bleeding, the vet told her it was cause she was never home and it needed someone with it- she got another bird and placed it in a cage in the same room for company and the bird stopped.

Answer 6

African Greys are very sensitive birds.It is said that they have an IQ of a 7yr old!!!Your parrot is probably stressed out..You need to get him some toys or change his diet sometimes a treat helps him.Always try talking to him it keeps him going...or the problem could be that maybe you need to get him a companion...

Answer 7

If your bird is picking himself he not happy about something. I would relocate his cage and change everything about his cage like toys and diet. Let him have fun roam of the house and do anything to make him happy. He may need more attention too.

Answer 8

is he picking out his feathers? this is from boredom and stress so try and spend more time with him and have more toys rotating in his cage so he always has something to do. If the problem persists call the vet for more help.

Answer 9

Get him a friend, more toys or more of your undivided attention. Also, if you are in a troubled relationship and there is alot of loud discussions, this will stress any pet out to the point of self mutilation.

Answer 10

Causes of Feather Picking
There are both medical and non-medical causes for feather picking. The major medical causes include changes in hormone levels, external and internal parasites, malnutrition, internal disease, and bacterial or fungal infections of the skin and/or feather follicles. Interestingly, and contrary to popular opinion, external parasites (mites in particular) are extremely rare among caged birds. The non-medical causes are psychological and/or stress related.
Feather picking is generally a problem of birds in captivity. Wild birds do not feather pick because they are too preoccupied with their own survival and with reproduction. Captive birds (pet birds and those in zoos and avicultural collections) endure stress not experienced by their wild counterparts. Captivity, malnutrition, solitary living, absence of a mate with which to fulfill courtship rituals and mating needs cause significant stress, in addition to stress associated with confinement within a home (noise, confusion, presence of other pets, such as dogs or cats, which represent potential predators to caged birds).

Like people, birds are creatures of habit, and changes (large or small) in their environment or in their established routine can often create stress for the individual. This stress often results in obsessive, introverted behavior, manifested by feather picking.

It Is helpful to understand that feather picking represents one extreme of the feather care and maintenance continuum (see diagram below). Inadequate feather care & maintenance Normal feather care & maintenance Obsessive, excessive damage to feathers
No Preening Normal Preening Feather Picking
In the middle of this continuum is normal feather care and maintenance, represented by normal preening. To the left is the complete absence of feather care and maintenance, most commonly seen with domestic, hand-raised birds. These baby birds fall to learn proper preening (technique and frequency) from their parents. To the right of the middle is overzealous preening or outright damage to, or destruction of, the plumage represented by feather picking.

Bird behavior tends to be patterned and ritualized. With this fact and the feather care and maintenance continuum in mind, it should not be too difficult to appreciate why captive birds, experiencing multiple stresses day after day, continuously pick at their feathers. There is little difference between drawing a feather through the beak to condition it (preening) and doing the same thing but clamping down on the feather midway through the process and cutting it in half or pulling it out (feather picking).

Most caged birds seem prone to feather picking. The groups of birds most notorious for engaging in this vice include African gray and Timneh parrots, cockatoos, macaws, conures, gray-cheeked parakeets, and cockatiels. Interestingly, we rarely see feather picking budgies or Amazon parrots. We do, however, see a self-mutilation syndrome in Amazon parrots and occasionally in other species (African gray parrots, macaws). This may represent the way in which some of these birds cope with or manifest stress. Others believe that the condition is an infectious disease, possibly of viral origin. It is not uncommon for afflicted birds to mutilate their skin (toes, wing webs, groin and armpit areas). This constant and continual trauma results in infection and failure of these wounded areas to heal. These birds must be prevented from engaging in this self-trauma through use of collars, bandages, etc. They also must be treated aggressively with systemic antibiotics (injections are preferable).

Treating and Preventing Feather Picking
From the above discussion it should be obvious that there are no quick and/or easy solutions for psychological or stress-induced feather picking. Col-lars fashioned from discarded x-ray film or certain acrylics can be fitted and applied. These materials create an artificial barrier between the bird's beak and its feathers. Collars treat the symptoms (the feather picking and mutilation) but do not eliminate the underlying cause(s). In fact, collars themselves can be very stressful to caged birds and should only be applied when it is necessary to arrest self-mutilation and prevent hemorrhage, or as a last resort when all else fails. Furthermore, collars create problems of their own. Besides causing great stress to the bird, they also prevent normal feather maintenance (preening).
If medical causes for feather picking have been ruled out, and boredom (solitary confinement) is regarded as the major cause of feather picking, then you as the bird owner must be prepared to make changes. Increasing the amount of time you spend with your bird will greatly reduce feather picking tendencies because the bird is kept otherwise engaged.

Sometimes changing the location of the bird's cage and/or perch is helpful. The suitability of the new location will depend upon the temperament of the bird and the relative unsuitability of the previous location. For example, a feather picking African gray parrot (normally shy and suspicious) might be better off in a more private and secluded area of the house than in a heavily trafficked and noisy locale. By contrast, an umbrella cockatoo (docile, affectionate, gregarious) that lives in relative isolation and that has begun to feather pick might be better off in a very public area of the house. If a feather picker lives in a very small cage or has limited living space, it might be beneficial to provide a larger cage or a more spacious living environment

Some feather pickers may not receive adequate quiet. Providing these birds with a more quiet and secluded locale and covering the cage at night may helpful. The latter is most important because it provides a certain period each day or night during which absolute privacy and freedom from a "fish bowl" existence is assured.

Bathing or misting a feather picker on a daily or otherwise regular basis may be beneficial because wetting the feathers encourages normal preening behavior. The hope is that the bird will spend more time conditioning the plumage and less time chewing on feathers or pulling them out.

Boredom and resultant feather picking may be combated by providing a wide variety of foods. Emphasis should be placed on foods that require some time and effort to eat (non-shelled walnuts and other nuts, string beans, snow peas, macaroni and cheese) or those representing a variety of colors, shapes, and textures. This "recreational feeding" keeps bird stimulated and interested in the food, increases the amount of time required to eat, and decreases the amount of free time that could be spent feather picking.

The same factors should be considered when providing toys with which a caged bird can play. The widest variety and assortment possible should be offered. The toys (chains, bells, rawhide and hardwood pieces, mirrors, hard rubber toys) should be durable and appropriate for the size and type of bird being considered. Toys should stimulate and hold the bird's interest as much as possible. It is important to provide natural objects that a bird can investigate, chew up, and rip apart. Branches from non-toxic trees, with leaves (eucalyptus) and large pine cones, can be offered to satisfy these destructive tendencies. These objects should be clean and free of insecticide and herbicide residues. It is equally important to provide objects that can fully involve the bird in actual physical exercise (large ropes to climb on, large paper bags, and cardboard boxes with holes). Appliances (radio, tape recorder, television, etc.) that stimulate the bird's other senses should also be considered and provided whenever possible. A feather picker whose attention is diverted and held by these types of toys and diversions will spend less time pursuing its vice.

Popular Remedies May Not Work
There are certain popular remedies for feather picking. Foul tasting sprays applied to the feathers (Bitter Apple, Listerine, etc.), grinding or notching of the lower beak to make destruction of the feathers more difficult, and use of tranquilizers have all been recommended over the years to treat the chronic feather picker. Unfortunately, none of these is truly effective. They merely treat the symptom (feather picking) but do not treat the causes of feather picking. Under certain circumstances, however, some of these remedies may provide some help or relief.
One suggestion that should be given serious consideration is not clipping the wings of birds that mutilate their feathers, especially the flight feathers. The rationale for this recommendation is that feather picking birds need no "excuse" to be destructive to their feathers; this procedure usually provides one. Though wing trimming is not disfiguring, it does involve trimming of the largest and longest of the bird's .feathers. Feather pickers or birds prone to this vice can discover these altered feathers and begin to methodically and obsessively chew and split that part of the quill that remains of the clipped feathers. The result of this mutilation is a series of frayed feather quills that rarely drop out during the next molt and . to be retained indefinitely.

If you elect not to clip your bird's wings because this consideration, you must be willing to accept the liabilities of a fully flighted bird in the home. Make the decision carefully.

In cases of chronic feather picking, close scrutiny of the bird and its interactions with its environment can help establish a program of behavioral modification. A qualified avian behaviorist should be enlisted this remedy is to be pursued. Behavioral modification may be of tremendous value in reducing stress, treating stress-induced problems of caged birds, and treating obnoxious behavioral problems.

Some cases of severe chronic feather picking may not respond to any kind of treatment. Damage to or destruction of the feather follicles from repeated trauma to the skin may result in permanent feather loss or growth of abnormal feathers. These pet birds tend also to be unmanageable and very difficult to handle. Placing these birds in a breeding or avicultural situation may be the most practical alternative. Unfortunately, this is never an easy decision for a devoted bird owner.