PVC, Plastics, and Other Poisons

[Larry, Baby and Me]

Some of you have been PMing me and emailing me with info... and I do appreciate it. Thanks.

We will be using this thread to share and discuss plastics (PVC), metals, and other things

Here is a link that I received and I am passing it on to all of you. At first glance this info looks helpful - but if you read carefully the writer is way off base. Plastics are poison and not to be ingested by birds. It is okay to play with plastic items such as wiffle balls and the such --- but if your bird chews on the plastic enough to break off pieces - then you must assume that the bird is also swallowing the pieces.

Here is the link that was sent to me... Beware of what you read.

http://www.cityparrots.org/2008/01/07/christmas-toys-making-pet-birds-sick/

Here is a link to some pics I took of plastic that I "used" to allow Baby to chew on. http://www.happybirdy.com/pvc_hazards.htm

And here is a link to a dangerous toy... http://www.happybirdy.com/dangerous_toy.htm

[Patty, Linus and Co.]

Larry,
This some scary stuff. I hope someday someone is successful enough with a lawsuit over the negligent death of their beloved pet to cause there be standards (if only out of fear of liability).

Patty

[Dot]

then you must assume that the bird is also swallowing the pieces

Are you talking about the more brittle plastics that a bird could get a tiny splinter of in his mouth and perhaps swallow?

If birds swallowing plastic were such a killer, wouldn't it show up in a necropsy? Wouldn't we have heard of it before now? Would all those pet toy makers risk legal liability by putting plastic parts on their toys?

Also, I have a really dumb question about knives. I have some good knives and some cheap knives. I don't know what they are made of. When I sharpen them, am I actually taking off a tiny layer of the knife? If so, wouldn't that get on my floor and be carried through the air system to anywhere, including my birds' food dishes? Should I sharpen knives outside? Sorry to be so dumb about this, but I am clueless.

[Larry, Baby and Me]

Oh boy --- first let me say this about that.

In the United States, birds and all other animals are considered possessions - like a watch or a ring. You "might" get the price of the bird paid in a lawsuit - but it is unlikely. Only Florida and Hawaaii consider dogs as having some pet/companionship value where you could get pain and suffering damages paid to you.

Dot -- you said.. "Are you talking about the more brittle plastics that a bird could get a tiny splinter of in his mouth and perhaps swallow?"

Yep - but I am talking more than the splinter effect. I am talking about ANY plastic that is swallowed by a bird.

Almost all plastics are PVC (Poly Vynle Chloride)... from the rock hard to the rubbery soft. And it doesn't make any difference what color it is. I have seen on some boards where long-time and supposidly "experienced" bird owners have said, "the black stuff is bad but the white stuff is okay".
Those posters were as wrong as can be. I did not post a response bcause I no longer post there.

PVC is the most poisonous compound man has ever made. It has been said - all plastics that were ever made are still with us today. They never fully bio-degrade.

Here is "some" info I have gathered on PVC...

PVC Hazards

Info from the EPA website...

"Cancer of the liver has been associated with occupational exposures to arsenic, copper, and vinyl chloride."

Just smell the object... that "funny" plastic smell is "poly" vinyl chloride or PVC for short. The odor you smell is the gases being released from the PolyVinylChloride in them. Those gases are chlorine gas - and monochloride was used in mustard gas during WWI.

So it ain't good.

Please consider this... If a bird chews something apart and you see little bits and pieces of it laying around... then you MUST assume that your bird has in fact ingested some of it. No one can say for certain that their bird did not in fact ingest some of the pieces that they tore apart from the object.

I made that dreadful mistake with my Baby and it almost killed her. Zinc poisoning from a beaded metal window chain that I allowed her to chew on because it kept her quiet and out of my hair. I thought - at least she is happy chewing on that... She wouldn't swallow any of it because it's not food. Yeah and she did swallow some of it - and it darned near killed her.

The new car smell? - PolyVinylChloride (PVC)
The new shower curtain smell? - PolyVinylChloride (PVC)
New window shade smell? - PolyVinylChloride (PVC)
Johny's rubber ducky? - PolyVinylChloride (PVC)

Most plastic and rubber products are PolyVinylChloride. PVC is not just limited to lawn furniture and the plastic pipes that supply our homes with water... from rock hard plastic to the rubbery soft plastic gloves (latex is natural rubber and not plastic).

Now if little Johny never chews and swallows his bubber ducky - then there is not a problem he will poop it out... but our birds do chew and they do swallow.

The GreenPiece people and ones like them would have us rid the earth of PVC... that thinking is totally idiotic. An airplane would be too heavy to fly if it were not for plastics. Ridding the earth of PVC products would throw the entire human race back to the stone ages.

The moral of the story... if it ain't metal and if it ain't wood - then it is plastic. And if it is plastic then most likely it is PVC.

And you might want to be cautous about the rock hard plastic such as the acrylic toys... they might be too hard for some birds to bite pieces off but my Umbie has cracked a few.

Dot - you said "If birds swallowing plastic were such a killer, wouldn't it show up in a necropsy?"

Please see the thread we had recently on necropsies... that wil fill you in on how many are not done. And "if" they are ever done - thorough tests are seldomly done.

Dot - you said... " Wouldn't we have heard of it before now?"

Uhhh - nope. How many of us have toxic cages in our homes and we "trust" -- oh how we do "trust" the folks who sell them to us to tell us the truth. The sellers don't know the truth and they don't care to know.

Dot - you said... "Would all those pet toy makers risk legal liability by putting plastic parts on their toys?"

Yeah - right --- read my first few lines above and then add to that the Mattel fiasco... who are the ones that dragged Mattel into court???? Their toys for our CHILDREN were 185 times the limit of 600ppm. Uhhh??? Remember Love Canal??? Caviat Emptor!

Now - back to PVC in a bird's gizzard, in the next post...

[Larry, Baby and Me]

Post continued...

You must consider that a bird's digestive system is entirely different from mammals. Birds have a gizzard which is a large thick-walled muscle that constantly grinds everything inside it. Some large pieces of foreign material (non-food) can stay in the gizzard for more than a year or two.

PVC is degraded (releases poison gases) by stressing it. PVC is stressed by bending, breaking, sanding, burning, and grinding.

Remember that the gizzard constantly "grinds". Remember also that foreign objects can stay in the gizzard for more than a year or two.

So - a single piece of PVC based object that is in the gizzard gets "constantly" ground (and stressed - releasing poison gasses) for a very long time.

Let me add a finale word... I personally cannot find any evidence through my research or talking to several vets and breeders that they have found PVC (plastic) in the gizzard that caused death (via ecropsy). But - keeping birds in the home environment in the numbers we presently have is a very recent phenomenon. There is way more NOT known about them than there is known.

Every vet that I have talked to says birds are their most difficult patient because they hide their illness so well and what avian medicine thought was true yesterday is not true today. The knowledge and landscape about these wonderful creatures are in a constant state of flux. We have many years ahead before we even touch the tip of the iceberg in our knowledge and understanding of how to properly care for them.

So just be careful and safe.

[bonnie]

So if we assume they are swollowing the plastic peices, are we to assume they are swollowing the wood splinters as well?

[FoxersArtist]

Larry,
Thank you for your time and effort into researching this stuff. Without you, I would never have thought twice about the plastics and some meals we have used regularly. We look around at all of the health issues humanity is facing today and wonder, why? I think things like using pvc (both birds and humans) is certainly a very good place to find answers!
-Anna

[Larry, Baby and Me]

So if we assume they are swollowing the plastic peices, are we to assume they are swollowing the wood splinters as well?

Hey Bonnie girl... you usually put me to the task - don't you. I love ya girl.

That's an excellent question. Yep - they do swallow those wood pieces. Some birds swalow more non-food stuff than others.

The point is - wood is a "natural" object. If is is swallowed - it does get digested - it does bio-degrade. It is not poison when stressed.

As most of you know - my vet and her husband are also breeders with over 100 pair of a variety of species. She shared with me this past Spring that she and her husband changed out the perches in all of their aviaries as they normally do. About a week after that - she found a prized M2 of her's dead. She did a necropsy and found a splinter of the perch inside the bird that had punctured through the wall of the gizzard. She said to me, even as careful as she is - odd things do happen.

A bird will chew - that is what they are designed to do. Give them natural stuff to chew and monitor them as to what might get them into trouble.

I forget who told me - that they had a bird that they nursed to health from a bad weaning. The bird thrived and lived for a couple years, and one day the owner found the bird dead. It was found that the bird took in too much seed (the tiny stuff) and suffocated on it.

We can't prevent everything from happening. Freak things come out of nowhere. But we can prevent the things we know.

[bonnie]

I'm sorry Larry, I don't mean to be difficult. I just know that I give Chicken plastic stuff. I monitor him, but if he ingests it, I can't really stop it. I just don't know about it. I want to say I will stop giving it to him, but... I guess I'm just being lazy. I should clean it all out and just give wood.

[Larry, Baby and Me]

Hey dear one.. you are not difficult - you are sweet.

Ya can't tell if he is swallowing any of the bits he chews off a plastic toy anymore than I could tell if Baby was swallowing any of the bits of chain she chewed on.

You just have to assume that if they can tear it apart then they are swallowing some of it.

Plastic is not an avian dietary suppliment.
Metal is not an avian dietary suppliment.

And that's them apples.

[bonnie]

lol
ok, ok. Me and the godmother will go through the toys and make some wooden ones wednesday on my day off.
Should I worry about hanging the wood toys from the shower rod? I mean, as far as mold or anything?
It's routein. He hangs out in the bathroom and plays with his toys while we're getting ready. I can't change that!:sadeyes:

[Larry, Baby and Me]

Baby before the metal poisoning and Baby after the metal poisoning...

[bonnie]

poor baby!!! Is her beak shiny from being sick?

[bonnie]

So if it's hard plastic like beads and stuff that I notice he's played with but not chewed up can I keep those to make toys? What about all these toys that are plastic but the birds don't chew up and get chunks out of?

[Larry, Baby and Me]

lol
ok, ok. Me and the godmother will go through the toys and make some wooden ones wednesday on my day off.
Should I worry about hanging the wood toys from the shower rod? I mean, as far as mold or anything?
It's routein. He hangs out in the bathroom and plays with his toys while we're getting ready. I can't change that!:sadeyes:

I think you okay on that one - just don't let him take a bite out of the shower curtain.

Some of you might not remember Doreen with her U2 Punkin. She only posted briefly on that other board. She posted for help with Punkin - he was bleeding out his nares. We all told her to get that bird to a vet now.

Then she didn't post again... so I emailed her asking how Punkin was doing. She said he had lead posoining and that he was on chelation therapy. Her Punkin got lead poisoning from taking a hunk out of the mini-blinds.

I don't know what the final outcome with Punkin was. I often wonder about him.

Now hear this... for all the research I did - all articles said - watch out for the "older" mini-blinds because they were loaded with lead... now get this... But you don't have to worry about the "new" blinds because of the laws passed in 1977 against lead in household products.

I say this to that --- BULL!!!

Now where do we think the mini-blinds are made--- you got it --- the same country that makes our cages - CHINA.

When are we going to tell Congress to get off the pot and start doing their jobs???

[bonnie]

Don't you know you can't tell Congress anything with out the $$$ to make them listen? lol

He does occasionally get a chunk of the curtian, but I watch him close enough that i tell him no and immediately get it from him.
I would just want to die if something happened to him that I could have prevented.

[Larry, Baby and Me]

So if it's hard plastic like beads and stuff that I notice he's played with but not chewed up can I keep those to make toys? What about all these toys that are plastic but the birds don't chew up and get chunks out of?

Bonnie - if you don't see any damage to a plastic toy - I would not worry about it. Remember - PVC releases its poisons when stressed... gizzard stresses what is inside it. So - if there are no signs of damage to the plastic toy - then there cannot be any of it that has been swallowed.

That is the same logic I use about these toxic cages... they are not kryptonite... if the cage does not show signs of wear of being chewed on - then everything should be okay.

But again - there is so much we don't know.

I have been thinking heavily about Jen's Reggie and where could he be getting the zinc from??? His cage is an HQ and most likely it is off the charts with zinc. But Jen says there are no signes of wear or chewing on the bars. But then I think --- we don't know what we don't know. Who in the heck can say for certain that there might be enough zinc leaching out of those bars that when he uses his beak on them to climb around in his cage that he is not ingesting poisonous amounts of zinc.

If he were my bird - I would get him out of that cage.

[FoxersArtist]

Also, Bonnie, with some shower curtains, the metal rings that hold the curtain onto the rod can contain lead. Many have been replaced with plastic, but some older houses still have metal curtain hangers, just so you know.
-Anna

[bonnie]

We have a rod and I have these decorative duckie hangers. I don't buy the ones with metal rings. Do you think buying cloth would be better? I just don't know. Cloth may not keep water in... Any thoughts?

[Larry, Baby and Me]

Ducky hangers????:rofl:

[bonnie]

Bonnie - if you don't see any damage to a plastic toy - I would not worry about it. Remember - PVC releases its poisons when stressed... gizzard stresses what is inside it. So - if there are no signs of damage to the plastic toy - then there cannot be any of it that has been swallowed.

That is the same logic I use about these toxic cages... they are not kryptonite... if the cage does not show signs of wear of being chewed on - then everything should be okay.

But again - there is so much we don't know.

I have been thinking heavily about Jen's Reggie and where could he be getting the zinc from??? His cage is an HQ and most likely it is off the charts with zinc. But Jen says there are no signes of wear or chewing on the bars. But then I think --- we don't know what we don't know. Who in the heck can say for certain that there might be enough zinc leaching out of those bars that when he uses his beak on them to climb around in his cage that he is not ingesting poisonous amounts of zinc.

If he were my bird - I would get him out of that cage.
This does make a lot of sense. If the bird is showing zinc problems and the cage is full of zinc, ther are many ways he could be getting it. Ie, Chicken would rub his beak on the bars sometimes. Well, that would scuff the paint enough for the toxins to get out. Even if he weren't biting or licking the cage it is still getting on him... Just a thought...

[Larry, Baby and Me]

That's my thought too Bonnie.

[bonnie]

Ducky hangers????:rofl:

LARRY!!!!:glare:
They are these little hooks with little duckies on them. My bathroom is very...well... full of rubber ducks!
Don't be hatin' on the duckies.... :sadeyes:

[Larry, Baby and Me]

Oh --- I like rubber duckeys. I remember when I was a tiny kid... I would hold them under water and fill them up with water and then squart the wall. Such fun. :D

[bonnie]

:rofl: I love them too. I have a ton of them. I have even had one beheaded by a wandering Chicken Too.... LOL

[jmfleish]

Ok, I finally made it to a different thread here! LOL!:) When Reggie came back with the positive zinc toxicosis diagnosis, I totally freaked about plastics too as I toys with plastic parts and Reggie is a plastic chewer. I was told by a chemist on one of the boards that plastics do not contain zinc, but I don't know that I buy it. So, that was another thing I took away from Reggie immediately, just to be safe. I do watch my birds and how they play with toys and I would like to think that they do not ingest the plastic they tear up but as Larry said, how can you ever be sure? I don't know what I'll do with plastics from here on out, but Reggie will definitely not be getting any that he can tear apart, especially if I can't find any other source of the zinc. I might also start testing the plastics that I use for zinc just so I can figure out if that was where Reggie's toxicosis came from. It'll be an expensive endevour but one that I feel I need to do.

Larry, I am curious about the PVC piping that is in almost all of our houses though. We use that for plumbing pipe and it's in most buildings that were built recently. Shouldn't PVC piping be safe for at least the use of water? I totally get the whole chewing and ingesting of plastics, but shouldn't the PVC piping be safe for things like the birdie butlers? I'm just curious as to what you think about that. I took the bottles away from all my birds to be safe, but I'm still wondering if they can be used in our pipes, wouldn't they be safe for the water bottles or even for playing as long as the bird wasn't chewing and destroying it?

[Larry, Baby and Me]

Jen,

Birds are much more senstitive than we are when it comes to any type or kind of toxin because of their physical makeup as well as their size. So - what might not affect humans can very well affect birds.

Plastic pipes feeding our homes with water are PVC, but they have not always been so. Years ago water pipes were iron, and then copper, and now plastic (PVC). Iron rusted - putting contaminates into our drinking water, and then copper with lead soldered joints was found to be poisoning humans, and now we use a different poison producing material - PVC... go figure.

As far as my research has found - plastics do not contain zinc but do contain lead. The Birdie Butler is made of PVC - the clear and the white. What concerns me about the Birdie Butler more than its plastic parts is the metal fittings. They appear to be copper. And copper can poison a bird. They could be brass which is a mixture of copper and zinc.

See... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brass

After long considerations about where Reggie could be getting the zinc - I point to either the Birdie Bagles or his HQ cage - or both. And I would not rule out the Birdie Butlers. As you know from my previous posts - HQ has tested off the charts with zinc.

Back to PVC... plastic water jugs that bottled water comes in used to be made of PVC that was highly toxic, but the industry has changed the jugs to a "less" dangerious PVC. Now - plastic jugs have a PVC rating on the bottom. Turn a jug upside down an you will see the number 2 inside a triangle. That is the federal rating for PVC to be used for water containers.

PVC water pipes that feed our homes most likely won't cause problems - but who knows... iron pipes and copper pipes with thei "lead" soldered joints weren't supposed to cause problems either. Remember about what I said of how PVC releases its poisions by stressing it... hence the gizzard grinds (stresses) the plastic inside it.

Lead contaminants are rampant --- recent studies have linked Alsheimer's to lead ingested during the formative years. The medical community has revealed that one in three Americans develope Alsheimer's - a 300% increase during the past 2 decades... and now they are linking it to lead.

With Reggie -- I suspect his cage is poisoning him. There is more that is not known about our companion birds than there is known. We do know that HQ has tested zinc toxic. What we don't know is how much zinc is leaching to the paint's surface. And we do not know how much zinc Reggie might be injesting from his cage. Let's put it this way --- if you knew that a metal chain or a Quick link was in fact made of zinc - would you still use that item???? The answer is an absolute - No. So, my suggestion is to get him out of that cage.

Please keep us posted.

[Evelyn]

Larry -

Where does bottled water come from? What kind of process does it go through?

Evelyn

[too&me]

It often comes from tap water in various locations including the City of Houston, some are bottled from natural springs but even they can be contaminated or high in various metals & minerals. Most do further filtration but I would research each brand I had an interest in before drinking or giving to my bird. We do not use bottled water at our house , we are fortunate enough to have a reverse osmosis filtration system that came with the house. Unfortunately that also removes any good minerals from the water.

[Larry, Baby and Me]

I was surfing around and found this written by Carol Highfill of Birds-N-ways. It is a good article with some important links. But - she says soft plastics are bad - alluding to the hard plastics are okay... but please beware - ALL PVC plastics whether soft, hard, and no matter the color will poison your bird.

Here is the link to Carol's article... http://www.birdsnways.com/wisdom/ww18eiv.htm