Egg laying Grey

[str8gone]

Good morning everyone. My grey Coco is still laying eggs. Currently she has laid a total of 6 in a 3 week period. The first three were laid in about a week and half time span. The next three began a week after that. My question is 2 days ago I took her to the vet for a deprovira shot (hormones to turn off the egg laying cycle). But she has been in labor with an egg for going on 12 hours or so. I noticed it last night before I went to bed. She was panting and grunting and when I looked under her I could see the egg bulging under her skin. It is now 11 in the morning and she still has not laid it yet and I am slightly concerned. Do you think the shot to turn off the cycle has some how shut down the ability to lay this final egg? I am just concerned because it seemed with the other 6 we would go to bed and wake up the next day and there would be one. Or we would go to work and come home and there would be one. It just seems she has been trying to lay this final one for some time and I am just a little concerned.

Thanks,
Sam

[birdlady49]

Coco apparently got her shot while her body was already in the process of producing another egg. If she hasn't layed the egg by the time you read this message, bring her back to the vet. (Don't even wait for an appointment; just bring her in.) You probably won't be able to do that on Tuesday since it's a holiday so this has to be resolved today.

[david Wang]

Sometimes, the bird is exhausted in pushing the egg out. Warm temperature helps to loosen the tension. From what I read, some breeder put a heating lamp next to the perch where she stays and she will have the option to move cose or away from it.

Other breeder will put the bird in a fish tank and put a heating lamp on top of it (with a screen top) and put a thermometer in the fish tank to moniter the temperature. They will keep it at 100 degree till the bird produces the egg.

Hope everything goes well.

It is also a good idea to give your bird some liquid calcium supplyment to furnish the lost calcium from egg production.

[huntress]

She needs to see a vet. Egg binding can kill her if its not treated properly, call for an emergency if you need to but get her in and keep her warm on the way.

[birdsnreps]

if she was panting and grunting, she may be eggbound!! rush her to the vet!! that seems like an awful long time to be laying this egg.

you can try putting her in a tank wtih a heat lamp, make it real warm AND humid. doing this has helped many hens lay their eggs when they became egg bound. you CANNOT forget about the humidity.

also, did you pull her eggs when she laid them? thats probably why shes laid so many. you need to try to leave them with her so she can incubate them, grow tired of them, and leave them on her own. all that time trying to incubate those eggs will give her some time to replenish her little body. after she grows tired of them, you can pull them, and hopefully she will take a break from laying eggs for a while.

you also need to make sure she gets enough calcim. you can use a good supplement like Calcium Care by Peonix Unlimited. Its cheap, the little bottle lasts a long time, and it works very well, i use it for all of my egg laying breeders.

hope this helps some

[str8gone]

Thanks everyone! I got Coco in to see another avian vet in our area. He did an x-ray and could not see any signs of an egg. He also did a gram stain and found that Coco had heavy amounts of bacteria in her stools. He stated that sometimes because a bird will hold their potty for prolong periods of time when they are laying eggs that she could have given herself a bacterial infection. He gave us some bene-bac bird and bactrim for the infection. Since Coco will readily eat from a syringe getting these meds in her is not a problem(lucky for me). She still pants some what and I notice when I pick her up her little feet are HOT. I don't know if she is working herself up to raise her temp for incubating purposes and thats what all this grunting/huffing is all about.
Also I have only taken 3 of the 6 eggs she has laid from her cage. I left the original 3 in there for 10 days at my vets advice. Since day one she hasn't paid them any mind at all but I will leave these last 3 in there until I think this need to lay has passed.
The vet did give Coco a vitamin shot of calcium to replace the lost calcium from egg production on Saturday and I will be giving her calcium suppliments when I am able to buy some. I wish she was like my other birds who simply LOVE milkbones for dogs. Then I could make sure she was getting some extra calcium that way.

Again thanks to all of you who responded especially on Christmas Eve,
Sam

P.S. Just a little side note...When the vet tech took Coco into the back room for her x-ray my fiance and I were waiting just outside the door. I heard the tech trying to assure Coco that everything would be ok and generally consoling her. All of the sudden Coco just busts out and calls her a b!tch. The tech said to the doctor "did she just call me a b??" And I yelled back into the xray area with a quick "sorry about that but you made her mad." Now I don't teach my birds to cuss but I do cuss myself from time to time. And when Coco said that it was the first time I heard her say it but it also reinforced the fact that these are not only beautiful but highly intelligent creatures because not only did she learn a new word but she used it in context!

[birdsnreps]

haha thats hilarious!! my birds havent picked up any my cussing...yet...i hope they dont...LOL

well what a relief that she wasnt eggbound!! when my breeders are incubating, they stay in the box most of the time, so they hold their poo in, and when they do come out to poo, they make HUGE MONSTER poops!! they are so nasty and ginourmous!! my little tiels will make poops as big as a macaw poop

[birdlady49]

Whew. Good news. And thanks for the laugh.

My KoKo has picked up some choice curse words since, apparently, I can't keep my mouth shut when I get angry!

[huntress]

ROTFL!! It worse than kids! I know parrotlet hen poops are the biggest things Ive ever seen when they come out of the box,lol.