PLEASE help- my hen SPLIT OPEN

[melodie_a]

Oh my goodness. Poor thing... I hope you can get her fixed up soon. Good luck with her.

 

[aggie9296]

dilute betadine in water is fine. we use it in human surgery, internally and externally. it will help prevent further infection. squirting antibiotics in the hole would not hurt either. but try to get some in orally or by injection. looks like a ruptured abscess.

 

[TeamChaos]

Her poop is bright green bits in white/yellow liquid.
She's still able to jump, flap, eat etc.
She smells so weird to me- not like infection (yes, I can smell that) but actually like a pig knuckle that people buy for dogs to eat *shrug* I'm guessing that's just the muscle smell.

Could it be a hernia? Would it ever split the skin?

 

[aggie9296]

if it were a hernia, there would be a bag or sac or intestines coming out of the hole.

 

[TeamChaos]

That's what it feels like- well, a really hard lump, not a soft sack but I'm wondering if that's just the drying effect on the tissue. It's obvious that the skin ripped open (and deeply) but it's a hard protrusion that is seen as black in the pictures. I'm baffled.

 

[aggie9296]

that seems it would be scar tissue or more infection. warm water soaks (with dilute Betadine) would soften up any debris or more abscess if any there. could that be an egg in there? is the ripped area the vent area torn open from a too large or broken egg? if it is separate from her vent, best guess would be ruptured abscess with scar/dead tissue. if it was a hernia, you could push it back in and it would be soft.

 

[TeamChaos]

101_0514 by Maxxchaos, on Flickr[/img]

I put more pictures up, if anyone is kind enough to look at more ugly pictures of my poor chicken's owwie. I'm hoping that with the up angle and better lighting, you can get a true sense of the wound. It's like the skin tore and is shrinking away from the hard yellow spot.

This is NOT her vent. Her vent is as normal as it has been for weeks- she's still got the white sandy poop but no tears or trauma. No egg that I can feel in the canal. She didn't lay today but she has laid in the past three days- she's currently my only Jersey Giant laying and the eggs are a distinct brown with a weird bullet shape.

 

[scratch'n'peck]

my best guess is still an burst abcess with scar tissue around it. From your description the infection is largely localized at this point.

 

[LeezyBeezy]

Do you think it should be lanced and cleaned out?

 

[GiddyMoon]

Quote:
I am not a chicken know it all by far...but I have lanced other animals..and yes..I think it should be popped. We had this happen on my cat's neck. Once day I noticed he had been bit and there was a small wound..we cleaned it up, I put bag balm on it and it started healing fine..almost 2 weeks later, BAM within a few hours I noticed his cheek was HUGE. So I looked, and sure enough, hard as a rock...we pricked it open and it oozed out..healed again..then it did it AGAIN. We did the same thing..and this time he healed up and has been fine for months...that thing might pop inside her and then you are going to have a dead chicken.

IMO..but I would see if I could pop it. A chicken and horse friend SWEARS by vetericyn,,you might want to look into it.