Changes in your bird should concern you, this includes changes to your bird’s feathers. Stress bars and feather bronzing are both a change in your bird’s feathers that you should take note of.
This article looks into how to tell if your bird has feather bronzing or stress bars
Table of Contents
Feather bronzing vs stress bars:
A bird’s feathers can change in a variety of ways, they can turn white, they can turn black they can develop stress bars and, they can develop feather bronzing.
This is how to tell the difference between the two:
Causes:
Feather bronzing:
Feather bronzing is something that your birds can bring unto themselves.
If a bird rubs its feathers too roughly, and too much, then the pigment on the surface of the feather will come off and will reveal a brownish color under the pigment.
When the birds are too rough with their feathers the feathers lose their ability to hold together well.
The pigment that can be seen on your bird’s feathers is only a very thing layer and rubbing the pigment off will expose the brown colour of the feather.
Stress bars:
Stress bars develop when there is stress in the bird’s life. For stress to cause stress bars on feathers the stress needs to happen during the molting and feather-growing stage.
Events that can stress your bird include the addition or removal of another bird in the environment, a vet visit, or an environmental change like moving from the pet store to your home.
These stressors can cause the bird’s feathers to not grow as normal and form stress bars.
Appearance:
Feather bronzing:
Feather bronzing will show up if your bird’s colorful feathers suddenly turn dark brown in color as the pigment in the feathers is broken or worn away.
If left to their own devices, the bird’s feathers will not only change in colour but the feathers will also start to look more worn out.
Stress bars:
A stress bar will make the bird’s feathers grow out slightly differently than normal.
Stress bars appear as lines that run horizontally along the bird’s feather. They may also cause this part of the feather to grow thinner than the feather should be growing.
What to do:
Feather bronzing:
The bird’s feathers will regrow again and will look good as new as they regrow, you’d just have to wait for the bird to molt when it’s ready.
You don’t have to do anything if your bird develops feather bronzing.
To ensure that the bird’s feathers grow beautifully, ensure that the bird’s diet during molting especially, is good.
Stress bars:
You’d have to wait until the bird molts again and grows new feathers before these bars disappear.
The bird’s new feathers will not grow with stress bars as long as the bird is not stressed during the molting and feather-growing stage.
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