I Have A Sick Finch

One of my societies got sick on Saturday 9/3/11, that is when I noticed her in the cage acting like he could'nt balance too well on the perch. Sunday 9/4/11 I put her in a small cage and took out the perch because I did'nt want her to keep falling. I put a clip on lamp on the side of the cage and this gave her room to move away from the light if it got too hot.
I used small lids to put her seed, egg food and oyster shell in and had a small water cup on the side.
Her balance was so bad and when she would perch her head would not stay up. When I looked this up it looks like its Twirling. It seems there are a lot of reasons for this but nothing proven.

Some sites suggest two medicines but no one is saying it can be cured. Some say it won't survive.

I didn't have any medicine yet so my daughter brought over her bottle of avian medicine called
Ecotrition-Marvel Aid. You put this in their cage in place of water.

The bottle doesn't mention twirling but in contains sulfadimethoxine which one of the other medcines mention contained sulpher, so I gave it to her
on 9/6/11 around 5:30 pm. I watched her all evening and didn't really see her try and drink or eat because she mostly stays laying on her side and when she tries to stand she can't balance or hold her head up.

9/7/11

Early morning I didn't see much of a change she still couldn't stand and I did not see her eat or drink.
10:am I saw her drink and eat some seed and bite of the egg food. Then go back to the way she was.

2pm I watched her drink some more (she could have been drinking her medicine before this, but this is when I was watching) then she went back to her seed and ate and for a minute or two she could balance.

I will update later.
She is a 3 1/2 month old white and black society, I have pictures of them in the bird chitchat board.

9/14/11
She is still about the same. She has moments when she seems to be a lot better and then she goes back to being sick. She eats and drinks fine but just can't keep her balance. I will just keep her in the small cage,probably from now on.

10/10/11
No changes, she still eats good. I still have her in the small cage, I put her food in flat dishes on the cage floor so she can eat easier. I keep her cage next to some other societies so she has company.

How is your society doing ?????

Thank you for asking, she is still the same. She eats and drinks but its sad that she can't sit with her head up for but a few seconds. I am just keeping her in this small cage so she can reach everything, when I had another society in there with her it would pick on her so I have to have her by herself, but I put her cage next to some other societies so they can "twitter" to each other.

I'm so sorry to hear that do you have any idea what could be wrong with her ???? Or what can be used to treat her ???? Almost sounds like a neurological disorder is a disorder of the body's nervous system. Structural, biochemical or electrical abnormalities in the brain, spinal cord, or in the nerves leading to or from them, can result in symptoms such as paralysis, muscle weakness, poor coordination, loss of sensation, seizures, confusion, pain and altered levels of consciousness.

What diet sod seed and other foods do you feed your birds ????
Sodium can sometimes be the cause of neurological problem in birds

I have researched it and its called Twirling I posted the articles here https://finchgathering.forumotion.com/t82-one-of-many-articles-on-twirling

I give her 3 kinds of seed, egg food, greens and crushed egg shell for calcium. I am going to start giving parlsey since its a natural antibiotic.

December 8, 2011

Its been 3 months since my society started "twirling" and today as I was watching her she has not twirled for the past hour. Could this be the end of her illness?

She eats oyster shells,two kinds of finch seed, chopped boiled egg and collard greens and some broccoli. The greens I chose for her have more calcium than other greens, so I hoped this helped her get better.

I don't know if this improvement in her health will last, but I will keep watching and update in a few days.

12/13/11

She is still doing good, the only time she looses her balance and can't keep her head up straight is when she panics, like if I am changing her paper. The rest of the time she is acting normal but I don't know if she will ever be able to go into a bigger cage with other finches and I don't want her to breed and I would be worried that other finches might pick on her so I will probably keep her where she is and she can see and hear the others as her cage is right next to theirs.