Two lovebirds, and since the heating went on they both sneeze a few times a day. Dry little sneezes, nares clean, nothing on the feathers above the beak, both of them eating and shouting normally.
The fact that it is both of them is what made me ask rather than shrug. Is dry air enough to explain two birds sneezing, or does more than one bird doing it change the picture?
Dry air is enough, and the timing you gave is the evidence: it started when the heating did. Indoor heating dries the air, dry nasal passages sneeze, and two birds in the same room get the same air.
The other routine causes are the same for both of them too: seed dust off their food, dust or bits of food in the nares, and water up the nose after a bath or a drink. Dry sneezes with clean nares on birds that are eating and loud is the normal picture.
Is a humidifier worth it, or is that overdoing it for a few sneezes?
Worth it through the dry months and it helps you as much as them. Keep it clean, because a neglected humidifier becomes its own airway problem. A HEPA purifier in the bird room and plain paper cage liners are the other two cheap wins.
Bath or mist them regularly. Mine sneeze less in winter since I started.
The list that is an appointment: frequent sneezing or fits of it, wet sneezes, discharge from the nares, crusty or stained feathers above the beak, swollen or watery or crusty eyes, tail bobbing, open-beak breathing, clicking or wheezing, fluffed and sleepy, eating less, voice changing.
And audit the room for irritants, which is the part people skip: aerosols, air freshener, perfume, hairspray, scented candles, plug-ins, smoke from cooking or a fireplace, cleaning products near the cage. Overheated non-stick pans are not an irritant, they are fatal, so keep both of them well away from the kitchen.
@crest_flat_back · last wk.
Your instinct about two birds is right in principle and does not apply here. More than one bird sneezing matters when the sneezing is frequent or wet or has other signs with it, because that is how something infectious looks moving through a cage.
Two birds sneezing dryly since the radiators came on is two birds in the same dry room. Context is doing the work, not the headcount.
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