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About a month ago I bought 4 Zebra Finches to add to my flock of 14 canaries. Within one week I found two dead and the next day one more. I thought the male had killed the other pair and the female. Didn't really know. I took them back and got two spice finches and two society finches. Within seven days, one spice finch dies and the next day the other dies. The society finches were in the same cage and they were fine. Puzzled I took them back and got two more society finches and a female Zebra to put with my male Zebra who had survived. One week late to the day, my male Zebra died and my red factor canary died, who was in the cage below him. I can not think of anything that I have done different other than purchase some finch and canary feed on sale, but I didn't just give it to them. I also gave some of the birds softened water from the tap. I usually give them all filtered water. Again, this has not seemed to affect the other birds. The only other thing I can think of is that I poured some of the seed and chaff from several of the feeder cups into a pan and took it outside, let the wind separate the seed from the chaff and recycled to feed. Again, this was given to several of the canaries with no problems. I change the bird's water every one to two days depending on whether they have polluted it. I have switched to water tubes that have little troughs so they can not get in it.
I took the latest casualties to store and asked them to have the finch autopsied due to my concerns that this may be something may whole flock could catch. They are going to let me know tomorrow if they get approval to do this. In the meantime, they said if any more birds die I can take them to the University to have them autopsied.
Anyone have any suggestions. I would be devastated to lose my flock. I am a new breeder and am just getting established with four new American Singers that I bought from a legitimate breeder in Chicago. None of those birds are sick.
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