So recently one of my Facebook “friends” posted that they have a “mild allergy to black pepper.” They were at an event and took a bite of the finger snacks that were served, and didn’t notice there was a hidden black peppercorn in the topping. “Within a minute they were coughing and coughing, their throat felt like they swallowed a cactus and their upper lip, the roof of their mouth and their tongue started to tingle. They found someone who had some benadryl, so they took that. Still couldn’t stop coughing, and if they talked or took a deep breath it got even worse.” This person did go to the ER and epinephrine was administered, but felt like “hell” after and was shaky all over.

Folks I am here to explain to you this is the stuff our feather destroyers suffer from…salicylate sensitivity. It’s due to the phenols in foods like pepper and other spices and herbs as well, but salic acid is in a lot of foods, in fact all plant matter to varying degrees. In fact this is exactly why I am against using essential oils with exotic birds. All essential oils contain phenols, some higher than others.

Clearing my throat, I know this blog post is not going to make me popular with the crowd for and selling essential oils. Hey, I am a user of essential oils myself, but I use them cautiously and in very dilute manners when it comes to exotic birds. I never use essential oils on or around feather destroying birds. In fact I know of several humans that cannot use essential oils for this very reason; phenol sensitivity due to naturally occurring salic acids in essential oils.

Exotic birds have very sensitive systems. The systems of exotic birds are high metabolic systems and therefore absorb anything from the air or anything they ingest much more rapidly than us humans. Essential oils are designed to go straight to the blood system…can you imagine how much faster they go into the blood system of a high metabolizing creature such as an exotic bird?

To add insult to injury when we interject phenols containing salicylates into the systems of feather destroying birds we are teetering on the edge of inducing anaphylactic shock! Their blood system and their respiratory system rapidly take in the phenols from the essential oils, but their filtering systems cannot rid their body of the phenols fast enough to prevent the allergic reactions.

If you have ever experienced an allergic episode from ingesting a food you are allergic to, or breathing in an airborne allergen you know exactly how our exotic birds feel when they are exposed to essential oils – like you are going to suffocate if you are not immediately relieved. The problem with our birds? THEY CAN’T TELL US.  They just have to suffer through.

In addition, the respiratory system of birds are not like that of a human’s. They don’t have diaphragms and their respiratory systems are not moist. In other words they have no way to help expel the oil from the essential oils out of their air sacs which means the oil can literally suffocate a bird to death.

Watch this video to help understand:

If you want to learn how to clear your bird’s system of salicylates and disengage you bird from feather destruction you need to join our Mutilation Syndrome Program at some point. Right now our Spring 2016 class is completely filled. We will not be opening a new class until probably Spring 2017.

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