cockerel with pendulous crop

[Hens rule]

thank you I very much appreciate the advice.  I'm at a loss with these crop issues.  Our hen who had impacted crop last year died.  I'm sure hers was from worms.
Hers wasn't as bad as this one's is either.  And today at breakfast he was not doing very well.  I am going out there now to try and massage him.  I'm relieved we don't have
to vomit him just yet.   If he has not improved by Monday, I will make arrangement to end his suffering.    I read somewhere that ACV is useful in preventing crop issues. We use
it once in a while here, a couple of times a month.  I'm thinking of increasing the use, and also increase our use of oregano oil, to hopefully act as preventatives.

No problem, I'm glad to help.
I've had a couple crop problems myself.
A couple months ago one of my hens had a minor impacted crop so I brought her to the vet and they helped her. Now she is perfectly fine. And right now I think one of my hens has slow crop which is about 90% good by now. When my chicken a couple months ago had a minor impacted crop the vet gave her a prescription that stops the swelling. And it worked!!! See if you can get your cockrol a anti swelling prescription that's for chickens. It may help him get some of that stuff out!

 

[chicknmania]

Well, too late. :

He was lying down when I went out yesterday afternoon, and obviously dying. I got him out and massaged his crop anyway, hoping it might help. I felt terrible as this obviously felt good to him, he closed his eyes and relaxed as I was massaging his crop, so I did it for quite a while, but when I went back out a couple of hours later to try it again, he was in a coma and I knew he was dying. I just hate to see them suffer and am kicking myself for not doing something sooner, but sometimes it's hard to keep a good eyeball on them all. I think we just have too many birds.

anyway, I have since done some research and learned about actually flushing the crop with water and oil in the event of an impacted crop. So I will know what to watch for and do, in the event this ever happens again, which I pray that it will not.
Do you know why your birds' crops became impacted? That is my main worry right now. Unless he picked up wire or string or something, the grass has not been growing and although they have been out on the very few warm days we've had lately, I can't imagine that he would eat enough dormant brown grass to cause this. We have been battling the horrible capillary worms, as I said, and I was thankful for our very cold winter and spring, hopeful that it might help to kill off any capillary worm eggs or vectors that might be left, but we are due for another cool, wet spring like we had last year, so it looks like we will be continuing with the deworming schedule.

Again, thank you for the advice.

 

[Hens rule]

Im sorry about your rooster. Im glad to help.
The worms may have caused his impaction. And yes grass can cause impactions in the crop and in other parts of chickens bodys. But its more likely that the worms caused it.
My chickens got impacted and slow crops from... well the one who had the impaction had i think eaten a piece of paper plate that i left out in the coop. After we brought her to the vet and they put her on a prescription she was good. And the one whos slow crop is almost healled i think had eaten alot of wet straw.
I dont think wire can cause impactions it would more likely poke him inside but string can cause that but like i said its probely worms. If you would like to try and save your rooster get a shot fill it with electrolights (salt and shuger water) And give him the shot in his higher leg area. Im not shure it would work but its worth a try. I hope your able to get rid of the worms.

 

[chicknmania]

My son has been taking care of them today and he confirmed that Draco the cockerel has died.

I'll just assume that it was probably the worms, though the last time we had a fecal check we had a negative count on worms, oh yay. But of course, I didn't do fecal on all of them. We do have straw in our barn though. And who knows what else he could have swallowed.

That is amusing about the paper plate. Last fall one of our GC hens snatched a scrap of tinfoil out of my hand, and gulped it down before I had a chance to do anything more than yell "hey!". I'd been giving them treats. Anyway, i was sure something bad would happen to her, but that's been months ago, and she's still cheerful as ever.....

But I think I will get a couple of syringes for our chicken first aid kit and think about the electrolyte injections if I ever need it. We have avian specific electrolyte powder. Would I just mix it according to directions, and use that? And how much?

 

[Hens rule]

I'm sorry about your cockrol.
Yes you can just mix it to directions and for 1 chicken I would fill a syringe up 1/2 to all the way and drip a little at once down the chickens thought. But be careful to not get the electrolight down his/her air pipe. That would not be good. But if the chicken has enough energy you can just let them drink out of a bowl.
To get rid of worms very quickly you can use de. Oh also as you probably already know a small amount of tin foil will not hurt chickens! She probably pooped it out by now!!! Lol!!!

 

[chicknmania]

Use DE for worms? I don't know....Capillary worms bury themselves in lining of the chicken's digestive tract. That's why they're so hard to get rid of. They killed several of our nice birds. Even after we figured out what was wrong and were treating them, (we used Levamisole and later a dewormer the vet gave us) they still died. We've tried rotating dewormers to prevent the worms from developing a resistance, and as I said, I was hoping that the cold winter would have killed off the vectors. Our last hen that had them, we eradicated the worms, but she developed pneumonia as a complication. Despite our best efforts, she died. I'm very discouraged by all this. We've used DE in the dust bath before, but we also use other things.

 

[dawg53]

I'm sorry about your cockrol.
Yes you can just mix it to directions and for 1 chicken I would fill a syringe up 1/2 to all the way and drip a little at once down the chickens thought. But be careful to not get the electrolight down his/her air pipe. That would not be good. But if the chicken has enough energy you can just let them drink out of a bowl.
To get rid of worms very quickly you can use de. Oh also as you probably already know a small amount of tin foil will not hurt chickens! She probably pooped it out by now!!! Lol!!!

DE will not prevent nor treat for worms. It is ineffective when wet, just like inside the chickens innards.

 

[Hens rule]

Use DE for worms?  I don't know....Capillary worms bury themselves in lining of the chicken's digestive tract.  That's why they're so hard to get rid of.  They killed several of our nice birds.  Even after we figured out what was wrong and were treating them,  (we used Levamisole and later a dewormer the vet gave us) they still died.  We've tried rotating dewormers to prevent the worms from developing a resistance, and as I said, I was hoping that the cold winter would have killed off the vectors.  Our last hen that had them, we eradicated the worms, but she developed pneumonia as a complication.  Despite our best efforts, she died.  I'm very discouraged by all this. We've used DE in the dust bath before, but we also use other things.

DE can be used to treat and prevent worms but I'm not shure it would kill that breed of worm since they stay on the sides of chickens intestants but I think it's worth a try because even if it does not kill the worms it will probably kill the eggs.

DE will not prevent nor treat for worms. It is ineffective when wet, just like inside the chickens innards.

DE is a natural dewormer it can be used to treat for worms and prevent if used right that's why they call it natural dewormer because it deworms. But yes you are right if it's wet and not mixed into water it may not work.

 

[chicknmania]

DE will not prevent nor treat for worms. It is ineffective when wet, just like inside the chickens innards.

Dawg, I've talked to you before about our Capillary worm problem. I know you are quite knowledgeable about worms, so i wanted to ask you. I used Levamisole last year, then switched to Rooster Booster dewormer in January, just to shake things up. The problem I see with the RB is that the pellets are quite large and hard. I don't know why they make them that way, but I think some of the chickens don't eat them because of that. I was going to try crushing them up some before mixing with the food, as they are on a course of RB dewormer right now. I like the RB dewormer in that I've heard it's an excellent dewormer, and also there's no withdrawal period. Or should I switch back to the Levamisole? My options are limitied, as it's a large flock, we have fifty birds, and they free range, I don't have the means to catch them to dose individually. do you have any thoughts about this, and my cockerel's crop problem? The rest of the flock seems to be fine.

 

[chicknmania]

Also, I read something that said that DE can be used as a natural dewormer, but the only kind of worms it would kill in a chicken (if it worked at all) would be roundworms. I read about it being used for mammals, but in any situation the site said it has to be fed in huge quantities for long periods of time. Again, not really practical for us, and, although I think it's a useful additive for the bath, I don't think I'd trust it by itself for anything, especially not in our situation. The site I looked at specifically said that DE does not kill worm eggs. I think Dawg is right, for a diagnosed worm problem, you must use commercial dewormer products specifically made for poultry.