blood on wings

Question
Hi Chrys, I have a male Cockateil who is about 5 or 6 months old. We bought him in October from a local Avian pet store.I took (Lemon)as usual to get his nails trimmed and she also clipped his wings. Now I have him home and for some reason he is flapping around in his cage in the early morning about 7am. He gets off the perch hangs to the side of the cage and beats his wings as fast as he can. I was concerned and I get up to see him but there is nothing scaring him or bothering him hes doing this for what seems like no reason. Now yesterday morning he beat his wings and made the tips where she had cut them bleed just a few drops. This morning he did this again and made even more of the tips bleed, and even bent his own longest tail feather. The bleeding does stop on its own and he doesn't seem to be bothered by it but I'm worried about my baby. Why are his wings bleeding? Why does he want to flap them so hard and for no reason? Also how can I get the dried blood off my sweet birdie? Please let me know what u suggest. He had beaten his wings b4 but not very often and he never bled from it. I asked the Aviary lady and she just said he looked ragged from damage to his wings. She didnt offer any advice and just clipped and trimmed and sent us on our way! Please help if you can. Thank you ever so much!

Answer
Hi, Debra,

Happy holidays!

The cage you have your tiel in is too small.  Your bird flapping its wings like s/he does is perfectly normal.  This is how a caged bird gets the exercise it requires...by vigorously flapping its wings the way you describe your bird is doing.  However, when the bird's cage is too small, the wings hit items in the cage (toys, cage bars, perches, etc.), which results in damage to their feathers.  This is what is also causing them to bleed.  The tail feather has broken off because of this reason, too.  Getting your bird into a larger cage will solve this problem.  The right size cage for a bird is one in which after all the perches, food/water dishes, toys, etc., are in the cage, the bird can fully extend and vigorously flap its wings without the bird's wings, head, tail, etc., touching anything inside the cage.  You can stop bleeding by using baking flour or any other blood coagulant on the area that is bleeding and apply some pressure over the flour/other.  You can clean the dried blood off your bird by using warm water on a Q-Tip, cotton ball, wash rag, etc.  

Chrys