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kendrafitz
06-05-2014, 06:54 PM
I just have a quick question about Rosie, my GWs beak.

She has lost interest in playing with her wood toys lately. She prefers stainless steel at the moment. Due to this, the top part of her beak has gotten linger than usual and in the sharper side.

Any advice on how I can get her beak worn down a bit. She has been scratching me lately and it hurts!!!

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2birds
06-06-2014, 02:33 AM
Is pumice stone ok for birds? If it is maybe she would like to chew on that.

Mare
06-06-2014, 04:44 AM
Owwie! That looks like it could be painful, for sure! I've never had that issue with my chain saws :) if nothing else, a vet visit may be in order?

kendrafitz
06-06-2014, 10:01 AM
Thanks Lori and Mare! She has sand perches which help keep her nails blunt. She has every material toy I can get my hands on but pretty much ignores them. I'm not sure about pumice stone though?

An employee of BP told me that once you trim their beak, it grows faster and you have to keep doing it. Has anyone else heard this?

plax
06-06-2014, 04:41 PM
I'm not sure that an initial trimming will cause a beak to attain (and continue at) a faster rate of growth. It may be that the growth rate accelerates up to a point (no pun intended. lol), but then resumes to its normal state. And it may vary from bird to bird as well. But since I've never set out to monitor the issue, all I can do is speculate. The only one of my four who requires periodic beak trims (quite frequent ones, actually) is Zaffer. He just doesn't like to chew wood for whatever reason. Salsa isn't a big wood chewer either, but he's a bit more into it than Zaf. Jack and Maynard, on the other hand, are feathered wood chippers! Perhaps Rosie is feeling bored with her current toys? Maybe new shapes and styles would interest her? As Mare mentioned, asking an avian vet may be a helpful approach.

kendrafitz
06-06-2014, 07:49 PM
I may have to call her vet.

She may be bored. I just got her a new toy about 2 weeks ago. All wood. Sometimes toys like that go in a day. This one is barely touched. She also had a bunch in her cage and some on the outside if her cage. Nothing. Sigh...

plax
06-06-2014, 09:05 PM
I may have to call her vet.

She may be bored. I just got her a new toy about 2 weeks ago. All wood. Sometimes toys like that go in a day. This one is barely touched. She also had a bunch in her cage and some on the outside if her cage. Nothing. Sigh...While it's a bit hard to imagine, if she has become bored I wonder whether it's a case of desensitization in the 'toy appreciation' department from continually having lots of toys around her? If that turns out to be the case, I'm sure it's just a temporary thing.

kendrafitz
06-06-2014, 09:20 PM
It probably is. Like my kids, she is spoiled and has too much stuff, which is ignored. She just really likes chomping away on the clips and a chain that her little acrylic hoops are hanging from. But that doesn't do anything for her pointy beak.

plax
06-06-2014, 11:51 PM
Salsa really enjoys chewing on chains, too. And whenever I've given him any of those colored acrylic toy pieces, he's snapped them into fragments in relatively short order. I'm kind of afraid he may accidentally ingest some of the smaller shard fragments which sometimes break away as he's cracking the pieces, so I no longer give him those acrylic objects to play with.

Mare
06-07-2014, 07:44 PM
Kendra and Tony, if you would like to try a foot long piece of oak limb on your birds, I would be happy send you one! I keep one wired to Sassy's cage at all times and she totally makes use of it. First she removes the bark then she gets into the harder stuff. Let me know :)

kendrafitz
06-07-2014, 08:43 PM
That would be awesome Mare! Thank you!!!!

Mare
06-07-2014, 08:59 PM
PM me your address, Kendra. I'll have it out to you on Monday. I'll drill a few holes to set wire through. It's been said that oak is, or can be, a poisonous wood to birds,,I know, for a fact, that it isn't to my cockatoos. I'm pretty sure the California oak that we have here will be safe, I just wanted to say this :)

Cedardave
06-07-2014, 09:33 PM
You can use one of those pedipaw nail trimmers to sand off the sharp end....give it a bit of a rounded appearance.We do this for our birds that arent big chewers.Be sure to hold the beak so the vibrations dont do any harm.Your best bet of course is to have it dulled naturally.

plax
06-07-2014, 10:00 PM
Kendra and Tony, if you would like to try a foot long piece of oak limb on your birds, I would be happy send you one! I keep one wired to Sassy's cage at all times and she totally makes use of it. First she removes the bark then she gets into the harder stuff. Let me know :)Thanks, Mare. I appreciate the offer very much. But I'm going to take a rain check for now. Zaf would avoid such a limb like the plague. And Salsa tends to keep his beak reasonably manageable. He doesn't tear up wood like Jack and Maynard... but he actually manages to keep his beak tip reasonable. It might be a little pointy at times by the standard of some folks... but he always ends up blunting the point on his own with his multiple activities. For one thing, he likes to periodically rub his beak on his cement perches. And that seems to really help.

Thank you kindly for your offer, though, Mare. I may take you up on it at a later time :)