My Cham is being suicidal :(

[jenstar]

So as i was heading off to bed I head a noise. I go to the room where I heard it, turn on the light and my cham hanging on to some branches and trying to climb back up (he has been sleeping for 4 hrs now). I open his cage to help him and i notice one eye won't open. Maybe he hit it on the way down? either way this has never happened before. So he is freakin out, trying to get away from me so i bring him back to his cage he climbs to the top, hits his nose on the ceiling, trys to climb on the mesh and almost falls again! I then take him out and put him on a climbing vine so i can check him out but after 2 seconds he leaps from the vine and luckily i catch him.. now i am holding him afraid of what to do next...

 

[ProjectChaos]

Species? Age? Sex? We need details to further attempt to diagnose this issue.

 

[Tifanydalpont]

just leave him alone in his cage for tonight and check him out in the morning... hope his ok

 

[pieter089]

just leave him alone in his cage for tonight and check him out in the morning... hope his ok

I almost shit a swing when my cham jumped once, didn't know they could do that. I picked him up off the tree and he didn't want to go so he jumped from my hand to the tree and dangled by a branch, I'm much more careful now.

 

[ferretinmyshoes]

He probably just had a case of night fright - birds get it too. They'll fall off their branch while they're sleeping for no particular reason, which scares them enough by itself, then it's dark and you have a prey animal thrashing around unable to see and possibly attracting predators (that's how they see it anyway), and then you grabbed him when he couldn't see well so that's even scarier because he thinks he may have been caught by a predator. So the natural response is to try to get somewhere safe before they either hurt themselves or get eaten, which usually means frantically running in any direction they can with no regard for barriers. Birds that fall off their perch at night will just frantically fly in any direction like they've been blinded, and they often hurt themselves on their cage. I always reached in and grabbed my cockatiels when they did it too, so don't feel bad about scaring him! It just takes a few minutes for them to calm down and realize they're not dying. I usually turn on a light so they can see because the scariest part for a prey animal is to not be able to see what may be coming for them or where to go to get safe. Hope he calmed down for you!

 

[jenstar]

Thanks so much for the reply guys. Ferret, you were right, after a while his other eye opened and he calmed down. I put him back in his cage and watched him climb the walls looking for an opening in the top. After 10 min if watching him circle and circle, i picked him up, put him on a sturdy branch and shut off the lights. I found him in the same spot this morning and he seems to be doing fine.