About Iron and Copper Supplement use with Pigeons My mother had blood tests a couple of years ago and the nurse called to give the results. She asked about what supplements mom takes and I told her that I had recently added an occasional iron pill to her schedule of supplements, as she has low red blood cell counts. The nurse, recommended I stop the iron supplement as she said; it causes constipation and turns the stool black. I said, that I would stop giving the iron supplement, and that did explain why she suffered from constipation right after the introduction of the iron pills. Live and learn, right! This experience got me thinking about two of the most common reasons I hear pigeon fanciers comment on, concerning their experience using Red Cell, the droppings get hard and black. Apparently, the hard droppings one sees when using Red Cell, are not a sign of improved health, they are probably a side effect of the use of iron which seems to somewhat impede the digestive tract in moving waste product out of the bird. The fact that the birds droppings are black, again has nothing to do with health, dye makers have known for centuries that a deep, black dye can be created using water, tannins, and iron. Our birds have access to water, there are tannins present in grains and Red cell provides the iron. It just seemed interesting that the two most often voiced visible benefits mentioned about Red Cell usage (tight, dark droppings), have little to do with improved health in the birds. I am sure that Red Cell and other iron supplements have their place for the racing pigeon fancier, however remember, there is also a downside to iron supplementation. Unlike many other animals, pigeons do not excrete iron or copper easily and therefore, they can build up toxic levels of these ingredients. Concerning Red Cell (which is a good multi-vitamin / mineral supplement), it was created to address iron & copper anemia in horses, and horses do not experience the problem excreting excess heavy metals that pigeons experience. If you do a search on red cell, on some of the horse forums, you will see that equine breeders have been moving away from the use of red cell for their horses except when addressing anemia (from low iron or copper deficiencies) in their horses. Yes, it is possible for a fanciers to see improvement in their birds when giving red cell, but that is mostly because they were not already giving a good all around mult-vitamin / mineral supplement. Therefore the pigeons are responding to all the ingredients and not just the iron / copper dose. To quote Dr Colin Walker DVM, who established the Australian Pigeon Company, in 1994, and whose company is a world wide supplier of pigeon medications and supplements: “Fanciers often add iron to the diet or copper sulphate to the drinker (to combat canker). These are both heavy metals that are quickly absorbed into the system but only slowly excreted. With repeated low doses, these birds look fine but as the minerals accumulate in their bodies they have a variety of effects. The most common of these in the stock loft is reduced fertility. It can be hard for the fancier to relate the dead-in-shell youngsters, clear eggs and non-laying hens experienced during breeding to these treatments, which may have been given months earlier.” With V/M Booster, my recommended dose is ¼ tsp per 80 birds once or twice a week depending on any other supplements you might be using. Because I am using Ferrous Sulfate and Red Cell is using Ferric Sulfate, Red Cell contains 50% more iron atoms per molecule. The equivalent dose for Red Cell (comparing iron amounts only) is approximately 0.3 tsp of Red Cell per 80 birds, once or twice a week. This does not mean that you cannot give larger doses, than I recommend, as I have no monopoly on knowing the correct amount for pigeons, because I am just estimating myself. But, you do need to remember that pigeons are not the same as horses and have a diminished capability to flush out excess heavy metals. Also, I am not saying the pigeon fanciers cannot benefit from the use of Red Cell, only that you need to be very careful with the frequency and dosage that you use. It is not formulated for pigeons and so you cannot use it in the same manner as the equine community might use it. Possibly, the company that makes Red Cell might produce a product that has less iron and copper and that might be a better product for pigeon fanciers to use.
Posted on: Wed, 12 Mar 2014 16:20:18 +0000
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