Tanya’s daily routine is constantly changing as she grows stronger. Her day has always started off with a bowl of chop (primarily vegetables), followed by me washing her bottom and putting Healx on her sore. Whenever I pick her up, be it to carry her somewhere or for exercise, I have her hold on to my finger with her good foot to help develop her foot muscle. That part has never changed.

It’s important to understand one thing with Tanya, she is determined to fly! From day one whenever I would pick her up, he wings would start going. This also has never changed. So when I started working with her I couldn’t do any intentional exercising because simply carrying her to the bathroom to wash her bum and picking her up and putting her down on a surface 4 feet away from her cage was physically exhausting her. It took all the energy she had just to do that. So for the first few weeks it was only that. Slow and steady was the goal. Her poor little heart was only so strong and could only take so much.

Then when I saw that she was growing stronger, I added a short exercise routine in the morning in the form of wing flapping. I’d lift her up and down and she’d flap for me. At this point I could take her out of the cage and not worry about giving her a heart attack. Then after a couple months I added an afternoon exercise in the form of wing flapping. 

A few weeks after Tanya came into foster care she was scheduled for her big vet visit. The vet had briefly seen her during the rescue’s open house event so was similarity with her case but this was the time when she was able to get her  lab work done and find out the answer to everyone’s question. Can Tanya’s quality of life improve or should we consider the alternative (euthanasia).

What a big day that was. The vet did a physical, CBC with chem, pissitacosis test, and a gram stain on her. She confirmed that the lumps on her body were indeed lipomas (aka fatty tumors) developed due to her seed diet and a severe lack of exercise.

Meanwhile Tanya was the perfect angle. The vet said she wouldn’t have even needed to use a towel on her. No fuss, no struggling to get away. She just sat there like a good girl and got her blood taken and her body examined as if it was nothing. She was the golden child of vet visit.

So of course we asked the vet the big question. Should she be put down? And to our delight, the vet filled with confidence in Tanya, said, not at all. She said: “She is just like my Ralph (her special needs amazon) and with the right care, her quality of life will improve.” I was thrilled with her response. Not only was she confident that she could improve but she has experienced this first hand with her own bird.

After a few weeks, the labwork came back. Her bile acid levels indicated that she has fatty liver disease. This was no surprise to any of us. In fact it would take a miracle for her liver not to have been damaged by all the fat her body was consuming. The lipomas were proof of that. For those who don’t know, lipomas form in birds when the body intakes more fat than it can burn off. Since a bird’s body isn’t designed to store fat, it develops fatty tumors to store it in. So, it really was no surprise.

Tanya came into foster care with me after she had been in the rescue for a week. She went straight into quarantine in a room away from my other birds. I kept her in quarantine for 30 days which is what should be done for all birds who enter a new home, even after the vet visit and lab work comes back.

Tanya’s vet visit was scheduled for a couple weeks after I brought her home but the vet had seen her briefly at the open house the rescue had held that month. Off the bat she had a plan for her. Tanya was to be converted to pellets with fresh chop and get some exercise daily. We converted her to Hagen’s Tropimix which was the pellet that the rescue uses for all their birds and then a low fat tropimix was added to the next food order. I immediately started off by feeding her chop in the morning which consisted primarily of vegetables with a piece of fruit to get her enticed. Since fruit has a higher amount of sugar in it, I used it sparingly. Tanya took to the pellets and the chop right away. She just loves to eat.

However, watching her made me nervous. When I pick her up she always flaps which is great exercise and exactly what we want. However, she would get so worn out by the littlest of things.  I could only pick her up for the bare minimum that I needed to in order to care for her which included taking her out of the cage to clean her bed, during which time I’d place her on a blanket where she would eat her chop and then picking her up from the blanket and walking to the bathroom to wash her bottom and walking back to the cage. She would get so worn out that she couldn’t even eat her chop without taking a few naps in between. Her little heart just couldn’t take anymore exercise than that. It was clear at this point that she has had absolutely no exercise in her previous home. 

A couple days after Tanya entered into the rescue, I decided to offer my services in the form of fostering Tanya. Myself and everyone at the rescue, knew that she was going to need an extensive level of care and would do best in a foster home where she can get that care consistently.

So that is where it all started. Before I brought her home, I had spent some time brainstorming ways to set up her cage so that she could be comfortable. In the end I decided on using a cage I had been using as a travel cage for one of my other birds. I was able to remove the top and prop open the door to make it feel more spacious. I used a memory foam pillow for the base of the cage. I made sure to air it out for a couple of weeks before I used it. I wrapped it in plastic from a shower curtain, then put it in the pillowcase it came in, then put a towel on top of that (for extra absorption)  and then a fleece lining to be change daily. The memory foam is meant to keep Tanya comfortable and help with a pressure sore she has on her foot. The fleece is the softest of materials so that her foot doesn’t experience friction. She already came with shallow bowls which she continues to use.