Dosing/Medicating Your Gouldian Finches/Finches/Canaries

We all pray that the day will never come that our finch gets ill and we have to
administer medications to it.
How can we possibly do this?

It is quite easy to accomplish and as long as you follow your avian vets' instructions there should be no complications.

What you need:

• surgical or any latex gloves
• a 1 cc syringe ( as most doses can be as little as .015 cc of medication)
• a quiet area to carry out the procedure.
  

First isolate the ill bird in a warm humid cage or environment ( hospital cage).
Do not dose/medicate for 24 hours.
After 24 hours have elapsed catch the bird in your less dominant hand.

Have the birds head snugly bracketed by your fingers.
Keep the bird upright and stable at all times to prevent aspiration ( choking)

Pour the required amount of  medication into it's mouth slowly again so that you do not cause any ill effects to the finch.


Then you must administer it to the side of the beak.
The side is quite sponge like and the medication will be slowly sucked into the
mouth without having to do anything to cause the bird to force it's mouth open.


I am not a  strong advocate  to water dosing of any kind as the amounts are
always in-sufficient.

If you have more then a few birds in a flight or cage and are dosing the main water source then you may inadvertently be medicating well birds and making them ill.
Also when mediacting in water the bird must drink all the water to get the full benefits of the medication, and I have to date ( Feb 2009) never seen one bird finish it's water supplied in one day.
If the bird(s) do not ingest all the water  it is a game of hit and miss and the bird eventually loses in the long run. 
I prefer if not manually dosing to put the medication on the greens or sprouted seed as these are gobbled up and I know they are receiving the full dosage.
When placing on sprouted seeds and/or greens I add as much solution to as much sprouted seeds. and or greens as is prescribed to be placed in the water.
I have yet to hear of water dosing being 100% accurate and until that occurs I advise people to  stick to more tried and true methods after all it is your birds' health that is at issue.
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