DJ

dont get me started on strays > ive had one here since sept last year which was reported and i received the owners details in the post 2 days later so i phoned him,he seemed nice enough and promised to call back next day,he didnt call back so i left 2 messages on his ansafone but still no word from him,when i did eventually get through on his phone i was told he wasnt at home but they would give him my message, i called the rpra again last week and was told to either ring my regional secretary or go through the process of reporting the bird all over again what a joke! no wonder some fanciers cant be bothered to report strays? i had one of mine reported in southampton and collected it myself and the lady who reported it was told that us fanciers never want our pigeons back so how many flown out or injured racers perish cos some members of the public think they are wasting their time reporting them? rant over debbie

thanks again guys for all your help/advice i going to buy some humane mice traps today even though my neighbour is adamant that we dont have a mice problem so we are setting them up on the floor under her bird table tonite i will keep you all posted and thanks again debbie

thanks for replies i.b and owen ive been using eradibait mice poison around the loft as its not poisonous to other animals and that seems to have done the trick (for the moment at least) my next door neighbour has a bird table which she keeps topped up with seed,bread,food scraps etc,all the time and alot of it ends up on the floor which encourages the mice i will send off for a swab/droppings test anyway and see what that reveals,if anything? i thought i read somewhere that amoxicillin is used to treat salmonella? does anyone know if it does? ive got plenty of amoxicillin so if it does treat salmonella that would be great otherwise i will consider using the baytril,im a bit wary though as ive heard bad things said about it :-/ (baytril) anyway thanks again for your help any more advice would be appreciated from people who have treated for salmonella or used baytill debbie

can anyone tell me me if a swab/droppings test will reveal salmonella? im asking cos im having trouble with mice at the moment and im told that they (mice) can cause salmonella debbie

yeh welcome to pb kieran were a friendly bunch on here and if you need help/advice like i did when i started then this is the site to be on there may be other sites but i havnt found any to be as helpful as pigeonbasics debbie

yeh ive seen one of my birds do this kieran, he flies up to the house roof then back down to the garden/loft and then does a few laps of honour but i dont know why he does it- maybe its the pigeon equivalent of weight lifting and hes saying ,look at the size of this twig, it must weigh all of an ounce, beat that :) ;D ;D

ive just had my first stray of the year arrive today but rather than go into my loft it just sits on the loft roof and then flies off as soon as i go anywhere near it, hopefully it may clear on its own by tomorow but if it does decide to enter my loft i will feed/water it and give it its liberty hoping that it will work its way home under its own steam :-/ im just hoping that this year isnt going to be as bad as last year as to be honest im fed up with all the excuses as to why some people cant send for their birds debbie

i do have names for a few of my birds but as peckedhen says it doesnt pay to become too attached as its always the favourites that seem to go this year has been a nightmare for me with the hawks and its only gonna get worse year on year debbie

a was given a pair of old birds that went on to breed but while cleaning out the loft i noticed something that looked like worms in the cock birds droppings i have a tube of equest pramox for my birds and was going to use that soon anyway for the worms/lice/mites my birds (not the gift pair) were tested late last year but came back clear of any worms but now that ive noticed what look like worms in my gifted pair of birds i was hoping to worm all of my birds asap before they all get infected :-/ debbie

brewers yeast is a good source of b vitamins and helps the heart,brain and nervous system function,it can also be used to help tired/flown out and sick birds recover i believe debbie

sorry to hear this tommy, i cant even begin to imagine what you are feeling like at the moment its probably kids with nothing better to do then kill defenceless birds but as they say what go,s around comes around hopefully they wont be able to help themselves and will start bragging about what they did and someone will hear something? lets hope so take care tommy and dont let the scumbags grind you down debbie

is it safe to use horse wormer containing moxidectin and praziquantel on the pigeons with 10 day old yb,s still in the nest debbie

thanks for that roland debbie

ive got a tube of equest pramox horse wormer but dont know if i can use it as a wormer for my pigeons? it contains 19.5mg/g of moxidectin and 121.7mg/g of praziquantel can anyone advise me? debbie :-/

yep many thanks for sending me that aye ready its much appreciated i dont like keeping my birds in,especially in this nice weather,but if it means the fecking hawk goes hungry then its got to be done debbie

a couple of years ago i didnt even know what a s/hawk looked like but then they started to appear and last year i started getting hit by them but this year has been far worse than ever before,whenever i let my birds out the s/hawk just seemed to appear so my birds are now staying in the loft till the hen s/hawk starts to sit her eggs debbie

i know the koreans are partial to dogs eating them that is

what a weirdo some people will sell anything debs

thanks kirky deb

welcome mandy u will find us all a helpful and friendly bunch on here and good luck with your new birds debbie

thanks for that strapper and kirky how much chlorocarb would i mix with how much water? sorry for all the questions debbie

sorry to hear about your fantail pecked hen ive heard that hen sparrowhawks can carry pigeons away but havnt actually seen it yet and hope i dont have to some of my neighbours already think im a bit of a nut job after running through their gardens trying to save my birds from the hawk but i dont know what they would think if i started running up ladders onto the roofs trying to snatch back a pigeon from the hawk :-/ the things we have to do to protect our pigeons debbie

can anyone tell me where i can buy chlorocarb from? ive read that its good for treating lice/lmites by dipping the birds in a diluted solution of it debbie

come on les tell us wot it is? pretty please i will bid u £1 ;D youve got us all wondering now debbie

thanks everyone for the info/ideas its much appreciated i think this year is gonna be far worse for us all regarding sparrowhawk attacks as ive been hit 4 times already in the last month and my birds have only been let out of my loft about 6 times in that period i had hawk trouble last year as well but nothing like this year when they seem to hit whenever the birds go out it doesnt help that my neighbour has a 35-40ft tree in her garden which the hawk appears from but hopefully i will be ready for it next time i spose it had to get like this sooner or later what with bops being allowed to breed unhindered > there are peregrines 20 miles down the road from me so i dont spose it will be too long b4 they put in an appearance(or their young looking for their own territories) debbie