During the moult, the natural replacement
of a bird's plumage, the bird loses its old feathers. This happens without a
loss of blood. New feathers grow at their place. They start as miniscule, pen-like
things coming through the skin. In this stadium the new feathers are in fact small
coverings made of keratin with arteries and veins inside which supply the feather
building tissue with blood. This means each feather is a living blood-filled structure.
This blood supply is essential for the growth of the feathers as the blood supplies the cell growth with the required nutriments. Thus, young feathers are highly supplied with blood in order to grow fast. In this stadium of growth we talk about so-called "blood feathers". After the feather is fully grown, its lower bole is hollow and no longer filled with blood vessels.
If a blood feather is damaged from outside or plucked, the bird suffers from an injury that can bleed a lot. Depending on the size of the injured blood feather the bird might even die due to the loss of blood! In this case the following rule can be considered as valid: The bigger the feather will become the more dangerous the injury during the blood feather stadium is. Particular bad bleedings occur in case of injuries of blood feathers at the primary feathers (at the wings) respectively at the tail and steering feathers (in the area of the tail).
In case such a blood feather snaps off and a part still remains in the skin it has to be
removed by a skilful person, e.g. an avian vet, immediately. Otherwise the bleeding
can hardly be stopped. If the blood feather fragment is removed under control of
a vet, the small skin lesion can be treated far easier than the broken or injured
blood feather.
In case no vet is available to remove the injured feather, you have to stop the bleeding yourself in order to avoid the bird bleeding to death. As a rough rule of thumb you should treat the bleeding with a sterile tissue for about 10 minutes (e.g. a handkerchief without perfume) under soft pressure. This can be seen similar to a pressure bandage known from human injuries. But please keep in mind not to press so hard that you might break the bird's small bones. Sure instinct is required! Popular appeasing medicine usually is not very helpful in case of blood feather injuries!
Broken blood feathers above the nose
Injuries of blood feathers often occur right above the nose. In general these bleedings
are not severe and stop within seconds without being treated in any way. The left photo
underneath this paragraph shows some intact blood feathers above the nose
(cere).
One can easily see the pink colour which shows that the blood feather is supported with
blood. For example when budgies are involved in a harmless dispute with each other
it happens that one bird pecks a blood feather of another one. This injured blood feather
bleeds for just a few seconds and afterwards a blood stain remains in the plumage, see
photo below on the right.
German version of this text: Gaby Schulemann-Maier,
translation of this chapter: Isolde Aufschläger 
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