Hello! I’m new here and looking for advice. My cockatiel (Ollie) is about ten months old at the moment. Maybe a couple of weeks ago I was cleaning the bottom of my bird’s cage (think the grate before the bottom part where you put newspaper and stuff to catch droppings) and noticed a feather with some blood on it. I read about blood feathers before, and about how to treat it at home if I couldn’t get him to a vet. It looked like the blood feather was dried though so I wasn’t sure when it happened, if I should even traumatize him with holding him down to see where it even fell from (he’s from a pet shop and isn’t a big fan of hands or being held by hands). It honestly could have been days before I noticed it, and I felt and feel horrible. I ended up leaving it alone figuring it wouldn’t be that much of a big deal if he had been fine for the last couple of days (I know now this was ignorant). It’s been maybe a month since then. He’s usually really loud and chatters all day to a point it almost drives me crazy (in a good way), but the last couple of days he seems really tired. Napping more than usual throughout the day (though as of yesterday he’s been napping less), doesn’t chatter as much and if he does it’ll be like a small whistle. He also stopped calling for me when I leave the room?☹️ He seems active, and does all the things he would normally do aside from what I mentioned. This led me to searching up things like a mad man and I found out that broken blood feathers leave a remaining piece and it needs to be pulled out?!

So if anyone reads this, PLEASE answer these questions.. Should I be worried about Ollie? Does he need to see a vet? (money for a vet is going to be hard for me right now as im not currently working) Is there anything I can do for him? & Does anything think the blood feather and this behavior change is related??