Lucky_Tango

I got Tango, my Goffin's cockatoo in October 1997 for my 18th birthday from my mother. He was hand reared, lovely and tame. He was all cuddles and kisses. He loved to sit on my shoulder and play with my hair, and I loved him to bits.
About a year later Tango started to nibble his foot. We just thought he was picking at the flaky bits on it. He started to stamp his foot on the perch as though it were painful. Then one day there was a cut on his leg. I booked him an appointment with the vet at the place where I got him, which was Pets at home. The vet there said it was probably mites and gave him an injection to stop them.

A few weeks later, after a shopping trip, we came home to find his cage and his perches covered in blood. I was very worried about him so i rushed him to the Peoples Dispensary for Sick Animals. They were very helpful. They cut off his ring around his leg and made him a collar out of old x ray sheets. They said it was probably down to his diet and I should be feeding him more fruit and vegetables. They also gave him an antibiotics injection to stop any infections.
       With the collar on, Tango became very depressed and would just sit in his cage. He did manage to find a way to carry on biting his foot though, and I had to bandage it up. This worked for a while and I would take him on weekly visits to the P.D.S.A for antibiotics to put in his water.
       More trouble lay ahead when the collar irritated his neck and he began plucking at the feathers. Finally, it led to him biting a great gaping hole in his throat. Shaking with worried about the amount of blood he had lost, I rushed him to P.D.S.A again. They quickly took him into the backroom, cleaned him up and put a stitch in his neck. If he had bit it a few centimetres to the left, he would have damaged his windpipe. They had to put a bandage around his neck and they didn't seem thats optimistic that he would make it through the night .
      I was devastated and cried all night long, but in the morning he was as right as rain and seemed to have got used to his collar and bandage.
       For the next few months I was dedicated to him. I changed the bandages twice a week and bathed his feet in a little milton each time. The cuts were slowly starting to heal, until we were confident enough to take the collar off for him to preen himself. As soon as he'd finished, he'd start biting again, so we put it back on again. Soon the cuts were completely healed and he was able to have the collar on permanently.

Since then, he has tried to bite a few times and I have had to put the collar on for a few days. Now he is living a normal happy life, and it was brilliant watching him play with his toys for the first time in months. He has lost one of his nails, but apart from that, everything is great.
I'd like to thank the P.D.S.A for their support and I regularly give the shops some clothes or books that I no longer want. They said it was all down to my dedication and perserverance with him, but I couldn't have done it without their help and advice.