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Did you know you can get Emu eggs in the mail?!? LOL!

Hope he recovers soon. :(


Could he have caught a chill from being outside? (Is it cold there?) Hopefully its just a case of stomach flu or something and he feels better soon.
 
I don't think its respitory~ it's not been that cold here~ the turkeys have been out as long as he has and they are fine...........

I honestly think he ate something~ and it's my fault because I let him run around us while we were working on Fort Emu and the Emu fence...........he could have eaten almost anything~ he's such a nosey little son of a gun and usually eats everything he finds...........I should have been more careful.

I'll let y'all know how he is doing tomarrow
 
Awww Cheryl, I'm sorry to hear he's not feeling well. I don't know if it would be something he ate (unless it was something like metal or glass), I've always known emus to pretty much have stomachs of steel and be able to eat most anything they have a mind to without it bothering them.

Do you suppose that he just got really stressed out with the move outdoors?

Keep us posted on how the little pooper does.
 
I wonder if you should bring him in for Xrays?.... if you were working on the fort, was there any metal around that he could have swallowed? a loose Nut, or washer would look tasty to him, and would probably clog him up or irritate his stomach?

Poor lil fella, i hope everything turns out alright, Im also just hoping that hes just a really needy bird and got really stressed because he wasnt with you guys anymore, and was stuck outside, and now being inside, maybe hell start to do better...

*hug* GOOD LUCK LITLLE Ebay/Peck!!
 
Thanks so much for all the support everyone. This is all unknown to me~ we are just kind of winging it here!

A lady who raises emu began emailing me last night~ and clued me into a book I bought which will hopefully help.

He looks better this morning. More alert~ better at fighting me! Had 3 movements with some solid matter in them now. Still not eating on his own~ but I did get some emu food into him this morning by wetting it and attempting to shovel it in. THAT was messy~ I'll do that on the porch next time! I think he's going to be okay if we can just get him eating on his own again. Still in the kitchen today. The emu farmer who wrote me says he should not have been put outside into fort Emu overnight until he was 3 months old~ so it is possible this is a temp issue and not that he ingested something awful. Now that he is warmed up, on the antibiotics and getting some calories in him hopefully we can get him back to himself~ I'll get some poultry vitamins at the store when I go into town this afternoon and offer both the antibiotic water and the vitamin water~ and keep assist feeding him until he eats on his own again. Then he will stay in the kitchen or the garage at night until he is 3 months old even if he does go back to Fort Emu during the day.
 
That's a quite positive update and it will help that you have an 'expert' to help now. Hope Ebay starts to feel better soon.

Keep us updated, a lot of people are living their emu dreams vicariously through you. :)
 
He ate! He ate some turnip greens tonight! Just now! Not much~ but a little voluntarily!

I've been assist feeding him 3 times a day~ not enough to make him full~ just enough to keep him alive. Got terramycin, and poultry pac vitamin/electrolytes in his water~ been dusting the butter worms and dog food pieces I've put down him with Bene-Bac (stomach bacteria for birds). He seemed better~ but did not show interest in food. The today he started picking at the food pieces but not eating them. Just now I was fixing a dog treat and he came over to beg like he did before. I offered him a dog goodie but he snubbed it~ so I offered some turnip greens and he took them!! I didn't give him to many~ just a small handfull and then tore up a bit more and put them on the emu food hoping to get him to eat the emu food when he goes for the greens. He's not taken any yet~ but

He did eat voluntarily tonight! A little~ but that's a lot more than any other time this week!!!
 
Okay~ I've got a few new pics for y'all. I probably won't be updating this thread every week anymore. Ebay is getting bigger~ it's getting to be the busy season for the snakes and I've got other animals on my mind too. Ebay is still very interesting~ but I'm just not sure he is once a week interesting anymore! I'll be sure to update on his continued improving health and I'll try to post pics of him at least once a month~ if your really jonesing for an update you can check my web page and see if I've posted anything new (probably not if I've not posted it here~ but there could be~ and there will be pics of the other birds and what not around here)
www.thereddragonsden.com

near the bottom of the page there are several links to "an emu in my kitchen"~ below all the snake and rodent links.

So anyway~ a few new pics of Ebay~
Here he is helping wash the car~ unfortunatly his definition of help involves stealing the sponges and running like a lunatic across the yard until he finds the appropriatly muddiest spot to drop the sponge!
washcar3.jpg


He also closely supervised the construction of the new Emu Fence with So-chee and my sister Karen
08April-emu5.jpg


I caught a pic of him this morning nibbling a little greens off the top of the emu food bowl......naturally~ he is picking the greens OUT of the emu food and NOT eating the emu food~ I ordered some emu "maintenance diet"~ I'm hoping that will be more palatable to him.
08April-emu4.jpg


Ebay looks a little wet in the pic because apparently turkeys ARE smart enough to come in out of the rain......but emu are NOT! I had just snatched him out of the rain and run back into the Kitchen with him. He could have gotten up and gone into Fort Emu with the turkeys~ but he was sitting out in the rain wondering why he was wet!

He's had a rough week~ and I'm feeling like I've had a pretty rough couple of weeks myself. But~ at the end of the day~ With a face like that who wouldn't spend all their free time and a good part of thier SHOULD be doing something else time trying to coax him to eat.....just so he can crap whatever you get into him back onto your kitchen floor?
08Apri-lemu3.jpg


I'm a very lucky lady~ to have such a great husband he understands~ supports me completely and doesn't give me any grief at all.......even when his wife is so busy forcefeeding an emu in his kitchen she can't get any of her regular chores done....so he has no clean clothes and no food to eat!
08easter14.jpg


See y'all in the funny papers!
 
Cheryl, you and Scott are amazing! I am so happy that ebay is getting better and that you are so busy with your new life. I hope you are holding up during the round of storms that are headed your way. Just remember to "go to the basement" LOL All of our love Bryon and Laura
 
4-12-08

He’s gone.
Ebay died around 1:30 this afternoon. We went to a new vet this morning. The vet wanted to euthanize him~ but I began crying so the vet tried some more antibiotics and steroids. He didn’t believe Ebay would survive and tried to comfort me. The nice man actually hugged me. I’m embarrassed I became so emotional.

Ebay had pneumonia. Probably caused by aspirating some of the food I forced into him in the last two weeks. He was in bad shape and I should have let the vet euthanize him. It was stupid to let myself get so emotionally attached to him. I knew there was every good chance I could not raise him successfully. It was amazing he hatched at all~ and the reason I resisted so many suggestions I write a book about it is I knew very well that we had only proven that I could hatch an emu~ not that I could raise one. Well now we have proven that I could not raise him.

This mornings vet speculated that he probably has a genetic issue that was keeping him from fully absorbing the nutrients in the food he was eating. That’s why he did so well while young~ while he still had yolk to work with~ and began declining despite all medical care~ at this vet and the previous one (I know I didn't make an update here~ but this is the second vet we'd been to see with him~ I kept holding off updating hoping I could make another positive update). He took another Xray~ there was nothing blocking him up~ Ebay was just starving to death despite my forcing feed into him.

I probably should have gotten a necropsy done~ but it is Saturday and no vets are open till Monday. Scott and Will buried him shortly after he passed away while I cleaned up his kennel and threw out all his medications~ and I’m just going to move on and try not to think about it too much. I never should have let myself get emotionally attached to him. I knew it was a bad idea to start with and I should have stuck to it. It wouldn’t hurt so much now if I didn’t let myself think of him as a “pet.”
 
RIP Ebay

Cheryl, I am so very sorry for your loss. It's not sill that you became attached to him, you are a caring and wonderful mother, and that's what makes you so special. You love with your whole heart and there are many on this forum that could benefit from your motherly instincts.

You did something that you didn't know you could do and now have the experience that most of us will never have. Thank you for sharing this remarkable story with all of us.
 
Cheryl...

Virtual hugs to you. I'm so sorry for your loss. I never even met E-bay, and I cared, so... It's not too hard to get attached.

So sorry...
 
You are not being silly. You are a wonderful, caring and very very special person. There are not many people who would let an emu live in their kitchen, clean up after it and care for it as much as you did. You showed your great love for ebay and did all you could for him. You gave us all a great gift by letting us watch him go from an egg to a living little guy. I am so very sorry for your loss. He will be watching over you at the rainbow bridge and knows you where the best mother he could have ever asked for. We will all miss him.
 
*HUGS* I am sooo sorry to hear about little ebay. And you are on the wrong site to feel silly about loving an animal.

I always cry when I lose a pet. whether a gecko or a dog. big and small. Us animal lovers always understand.

I am great full though that you took plenty of wonderful photos so that you can always remember little ebay.
 
Cheryl,

Your husband is a very lucky man!

Best regards.

Dan G.
 
Cheryl, I am so sorry. I have truly enjoyed reading this entire thread and living your experience through you. Because of it I know I will never have an emu running around in my kitchen, but to have my dog chase a ball and run with one, how cool is that?!!
In years you'll still have the fun memories. Thank you for sharing and bringing us along for the ride, it was a great one!
 
Cheryl Marchek AKA JM said:
I never should have let myself get emotionally attached to him. I knew it was a bad idea to start with and I should have stuck to it. It wouldn’t hurt so much now if I didn’t let myself think of him as a “pet.”
Click to expand...

Cheryl, I don't know you at all and have not posted much here on Fauna, but I have clicked this thread every Monday at work for updates. As I read this latest post, I sit with tears welling up in my eyes and co-workers looking at me like I'm a lunatic. I agree with everyone - you did nothing wrong by loving Ebay. You did what all of us crazy dog/cat/snake/lizard/bird/etc/etc/etc men and women do - you raised a baby as best as you could and unfortunately Mother Nature had a different plan. Thank you so much for sharing Ebay's life with us. You let us all have a new pet vicariously and the experience of having an "emu in our kitchens".
 
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