Impacted Crop

[littleschickens]

Hi all! I have a 7 month old Ameraucana with an impacted crop. I've been working on trying to get it down for the last week. She had sour crop on top of it and I think we have that under control. I just don't know what else to do for her. It's gone down a bit, she has energy and is acting ok. She is ravenous, so I've been giving her scrambled egg soaked in mineral oil. She refuses anything else. I've tried to get her to eat grit, but she won't. I've literally been doing mineral oil, massages 3-4x a day for the last week. I tried the gel from inside a colace. What else can I do? Vet isn't an option, and I don't want to do crop surgery because I won't cause her any pain. Any ideas or anything I'm missing? How long can this go on? Again, she seems ok, but I don't want to cause suffering if she's slowly starving; shes already small and her breastbone is easy to feel. She does poop, so I know it's not a complete obstruction. I'm worried that she'll get sour crop again. My son is so upset, he loves this chicken but wants me to cull her because he believes she's suffering. I will cull her if she's suffering, I don't want her to slowly starve to death. But I want to give her a fighting chance if I can get the impaction broken up. It's about golf ball size in the morning. It's not rock hard, kinda pliable and softer feeling. I think it's grass. I know the crop has no gastric juices, but how else can I get this resolved. Is it something to keep trying or am I fighting a losing battle? Thanks!

 

[azygous]

It appears this little patient has a good appetite and is eating and pooping. Is this correct? And the only issue now is that the crop still will not completely empty over night. Right?

When we have a chicken with impacted crop, often the chicken will be very sick due to crop stasis. Nothing can go in, nothing can go out. The digestive system shuts down, the crop contents ferment into a noxious stew, and the chicken starves while toxins build up.

It's a very good sign that this chicken is eating as that indicates at least partial functioning of the digestive tract. It's not that unusual for a small lump of material to persist in the crop after the sour crop and initial impaction is dealt with. As long as this chicken is eating and pooping, I suggest keeping up with the diet of easy to digest foods and the massage, focusing on trying to break apart the lump. Eventually, it should resolve.

The crop wall is very thin tissue as is the outer skin of the chicken, so it's pretty easy to feel what is in the crop. Grass usually has a familiar feel, so you're probably correct that this caused the problem. If it's limited to this very small lump, it shouldn't require surgery. But if that turns out to be the only way to resolve this, you need not be afraid of the pain element as chickens, while they indeed feel pain, do not react to pain with the same sort of panic that we humans do that makes it necessary to sedate us so we can be operated on or risk us thrashing ourselves off the operating table. Chickens will lie perfectly still without being sedated and while they feel the pain, it doesn't cause them the same disorienting panic that it does us.

 

[littleschickens]

It appears this little patient has a good appetite and is eating and pooping. Is this correct? And the only issue now is that the crop still will not completely empty over night. Right?

When we have a chicken with impacted crop, often the chicken will be very sick due to crop stasis. Nothing can go in, nothing can go out. The digestive system shuts down, the crop contents ferment into a noxious stew, and the chicken starves while toxins build up.

It's a very good sign that this chicken is eating as that indicates at least partial functioning of the digestive tract. It's not that unusual for a small lump of material to persist in the crop after the sour crop and initial impaction is dealt with. As long as this chicken is eating and pooping, I suggest keeping up with the diet of easy to digest foods and the massage, focusing on trying to break apart the lump. Eventually, it should resolve.

The crop wall is very thin tissue as is the outer skin of the chicken, so it's pretty easy to feel what is in the crop. Grass usually has a familiar feel, so you're probably correct that this caused the problem. If it's limited to this very small lump, it shouldn't require surgery. But if that turns out to be the only way to resolve this, you need not be afraid of the pain element as chickens, while they indeed feel pain, do not react to pain with the same sort of panic that we humans do that makes it necessary to sedate us so we can be operated on or risk us thrashing ourselves off the operating table. Chickens will lie perfectly still without being sedated and while they feel the pain, it doesn't cause them the same disorienting panic that it does us.

Yes, she's hungry and pooping. I did massage her a bit this evening and it felt as though it was contracting. From all my reading, I understand that the crop is just a holding place and not really an active muscle to "push" the food through. It felt like it was shrinking while I was massaging it and almost felt like it went flat, which was super encouraging to me. I went back out to put them to bed a few minutes ago and it feels big again. I'm wondering if she's going to have a slow emptying crop? I'm worried I didn't catch this fast enough and if it does indeed resolve, that she won't continue to have problems from it being so stretched out fir so long. Not sure if I should make her a crop bra or just keep doing what I'm doing fir a little longer. I've been giving her egg for about a week now, so now she's not interested in her feed. She's also getting shooed away from the feeder by another chicken, so the pecking order I guess needs some help too. It was a good sign, and if it did finally break up, I'm expecting some big poop in the morning.

 

[azygous]

Try to be patient. She's young and is improving. Those are positive things. There is no reason to believe she will have chronic crop issues from this. It sounds like she just ate more grass than she should have, but the issue is in the process of resolving.

In my experience with all sorts of crop issues, the chicken will self regulate regarding what and how much they need to eat. Offer a bit of egg as you have been, but also offer her regular feed perhaps moistened with yogurt or water to make it more appealing in the transition back to her normal fare.