Sour Crop Help!

[whittwhitt]

Sick chicken help! Looking for some more advice on how to treat my sick hen, Hester. She's a RIR, a year and a half old. I noticed her acting off about 2 weeks ago but thought it was because of the colder temps. She's lethargic, she eats and drinks fine, she's usually puffed and moves generally slower than the other chickens. She's always been a calm, relaxed chicken as well so I believe that's why it was hard to catch on to her being sick.

Felt her crop yesterday morning and it was still full and squishy. Feathers are missing from it and it has a purple tint, I'm thinking sour crop. I put her in a kennel with ACV water only for the next 12 hours until I got home. Added garlic water with electrolytes when I came home and offered her some plain greek yogurt in just a small amount, enough to hide the Monistat. I felt her crop and it is (I believe) smaller and you could feel tons of very fine rocks, a little bigger than sand I'd say. So it's mainly filled with grit from what I can tell. I massaged her crop for a minute or so. She loved the garlic water thankfully and tried to like the yogurt, I believe she got a full pea to dime sized dose of Monistat.

This morning before work I felt her crop again and it feels smaller, more firm. Maybe the size of two golf balls. I massaged it for just a minute or so and sat her breakfast in her kennel - small amount of greek yogurt with Monistat mixed in with enough boiled egg yolk on top to get her interested. She was still sleepy obviously since it was 530am and dark, but she had a few bites. Hoping she'll eat all of it when the sun comes up. Have her a lunch made up of the same thing for my husband to give her today while I'm at work.

Is there anything else I can do for her? Does sour crop or impacted crop typically drag on for this long? Like I said shes apparently been sick for about 2 weeks now but we haven't noticed . I also have oil of oregano which I've read helps with impacted crop if it's impacted. This would be our first sick chicken so I'm learning as we go. I'd love to be able to PM someone back and forth that has experience with issues like this. Thank you guys!

 

[azygous]

You seem to be doing pretty well treating your hen, but perhaps not giving enough of the miconazole yeast cream. She would need an entire mouth full, about half an inch to an inch, depending on her size, two times a day. I just pry open the beak and squirt it directly into the mouth. Don't try to dilute it in food.

Try increasing the miconazole and if she's still full in the morning after a couple more days, she may need a flush.

Here is my article on crop disorders to orient you. https://www.backyardchickens.com/ar...w-to-know-which-one-youre-dealing-with.73607/

 

[whittwhitt]

You seem to be doing pretty well treating your hen, but perhaps not giving enough of the miconazole yeast cream. She would need an entire mouth full, about half an inch to an inch, depending on her size, two times a day. I just pry open the beak and squirt it directly into the mouth. Don't try to dilute it in food.

Try increasing the miconazole and if she's still full in the morning after a couple more days, she may need a flush.

Here is my article on crop disorders to orient you. https://www.backyardchickens.com/ar...w-to-know-which-one-youre-dealing-with.73607/

Thanks! So feeding her, say 1/4 cup of yogurt 3x a day is fine, with crushed boiled eggs, and Miconazole? Then keeping the garlic water and ACV water there all the time. I just feel like I'm starving her but then on the other hand I feel like I could feed her too much and just make it worse. Not sure if too much yogurt or eggs is a bad thing/just feeds the yeast since it can't get past her crop.

 

[azygous]

Sugar feeds yeast. Food does not. I never withhold food from a crop patient. I offer mainly dry crumbles and the chicken self regulates what she needs to eat. Starving a crop patient, in my humble-but-justified opinion is cruel and unnecessary. I don't know how that "common wisdom" ever took such hold.

You will offer simple food but do not force it on the chicken. Do keep up the miconazole twice a day, and even three times a day is okay. Its continual presence in the crop is what kills the yeast.

But please do read the article so you know what you're dealing with. An impacted crop, if it isn't sour crop, would require different treatment.