Updated! - Test Your Diagnostic Skills - Warning, Contains Graphic Necropsy Photos

[casportpony]

Last night I found a hen below the perch and this is what I noticed:

• Very thin
• Lethargic
• Crop full of food and hard
• No palpable masses
• No cuts, swellings or bruises
• Eyes, mouth and nostrils clear
• No visible mites or lice

I brought her inside where it's warm, but she didn't make it. Since many people don't try their own necropsies I thought it might be fun/interesting to put or diagnostic skills to the test and see what we come up with. Of course much depends on my ability to do a necropsy, and unless it can be easily seen, I doubt we'll know for sure what killed her.

I'll wait until it warms up a little and then I'll start cutting. If there is anything you want me to check for, just let me know!

-Kathy

 

[Wyorp Rock]

i'm hoping to post photo's tomorrow when i hopefully have a look inside a chicken i lost today. heavy heart right now... but ex-battery i have had for year+ with respiratory illness and god knows what else. posting now to make sure i go through with it. have not done before. won't be so emotional tomorrow and the logic will take back over...i hope.

I'm sorry for your loss.
It can be hard to lose them when you've been taking special care of them.
Take your time, get some good photos and we will see you tomorrow.

 

[casportpony]

Have you seen this?

 

[Sue Gremlin]

It's a learning curve, and it's ok to be clueless!

 

[rebrascora]

So sorry for your loss, but well done on opening her up to investigate the cause and thanks for posting a video of it.
I agree it's salpingitis. Poor girl! That whole pink lumpy section that you handle and eventually cut into is her oviduct and it is packed with lash eggs, which are infected egg material and puss which becomes cheesy in hens. You can see that there were still yolks ripe and ready to be released from her ovaries, but there was no way they could get past all that mass of infected debris, so she may also have started laying internally as well.... which could have caused peritonitis.
Peritonitis is when an infection occurs in the abdominal cavity I believe , whereas that infection (salpingitis) is confined to the reproductive tract. With internal laying, egg yolks released by the ovary when they are ripe, drop into the abdominal cavity instead of travelling into the oviduct (in this case because the oviduct is blocked with infected material) If the yolks in the abdominal cavity become infected, then it is Egg Yolk Peritonitis (EYP) but they can sit there and build up to quite a mass without becoming infected which is straight forward internal laying and fluid often leaches out of them over time which also leads to ascites (water belly).

Salpingitis...... infection in oviduct and produces lash eggs some of which may be expelled but usually clog up their system like this.

Internal laying..... egg yolks from the ovary drop into the abdominal cavity where they build up and have no way of being expelled and may lead to ascites(water belly).

Egg Yolk Peritonitis.... those egg yolks in the abdominal cavity from internal laying become infected.

I hope that clarifies the differences between these common reproductive ailments


If it is any consolation, she would never have recovered from that.

Regards

Barbara

 

[Wyorp Rock]

@Jspenc02 I'm sorry for your loss. Thank you for taking the time to share your photos with us.

I'm still learning but, I do agree with the others about the fat deposits and about revisiting how and what you feed. Sometimes, even with changes in diet, some hens just simply may not be active enough or could even be genetically predisposed to pack on the fat.

I'd like to see @speckledhen and @Eggcessive give there thoughts as well.

This photo - I assume, this is where you initially opened her up. The "lump" I have circled - was that a mass of waxy "yuck"? What was that like when you removed it and do you have photos of it or did you slice it open. To me, it looks like what you will see with internal laying - basically the body has tried to encapsulate loose yolks.

Did she have egg yolks and whites in the abdomen like that?

I'm not a vet nor an expert - nor do I have the ability to use medical or proper anatomy terminology, I can only make a guess. Too much fat in the abdomen made it hard for eggs to develop properly all the time, so some were pressed back up the oviduct and dropped into the abdomen. Over time, some yolks were encased in that thick waxy "mass". The stress of the yolks and mass along with the fat in the abdomen, on the liver, heart and internal organs which caused some hemorrhaging - this is where I believe you started to see the bloody vent and eggs come into play. That many things going on internally, a chicken will decline rapidly. While Fatty Liver Disease, may be for the most part preventable, internal laying/reproductive disorders cannot. https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/dying-chicken-with-bloody-vent.1219521/

Just me think out loud.

 

[Cragg Klefor]

No excuses necessary, there is a first time for everything. If you can take a closer look at her reproductive system that may be helpful. A couple of pictures caught my eye, what are the objects I circled? Lash egg material? I'm sure others will have suggestions for you.
View attachment 1601221
View attachment 1601222

Thank you. Yes. The two smaller pieces looked like tiny egg yolks, the larger piece was flatter but same substance. All three were like boiled egg. They were just floating in there.
Yes tomorrow I will get into the reproductive system.

 

[Deltabwa]

I Butchered my chicken from this thread https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/fluid-in-belly-with-egg-floating.1202391/

I thought maybe a tumor since I saw her lay an egg after the swelling began but only once. Since she has purring a lot and in the morning she acts like she wants to lay and then quits after about an hr. I took a video while doing it, but got a text at the end and it shut the video off and I didn't realize it. I also didn't cut anything open since it didn't apply to her but I did pull out the heart. I can still cut them open if someone would want me too but time is ticking at this point That thing around the 2:50 mark that I am cutting out. What is that? Can anyone tell? It was split open, and completely empty. It also smelled horrible. I had to stop the video to take it outside lol I am pretty positive I didn't cut it and it had 2 spots that looked like holes.

 

[rebrascora]

@Jspenc02
Hi again and well done for investigating these deaths further. I know it is a bit daunting cutting a bird open for the first time. You did a good job.

The two things that strike me are the same as Kathy (@casportpony ) mentions:- The colour of the liver and the large amount of yellow fat.... there is even a crown of it on the heart and the gizzard is also encased in it. That is not good.

Are these photos all of just one bird?
Can you tell us how old this bird was?

If I remember correctly they were young birds that were dying and if this bird is under a year old, then that is way too much fat and I would hazard a guess at Fatty Liver Haemorrhagic Syndrome as the cause, although the liver looks reasonably stable.....in really bad cases, the liver just falls apart when you get hold of it. I would suggest that their diet may be the issue here and I would start by cutting out the scratch altogether. What else do you feed them? ie what does their main feed consist of.... Layer pellets/crumble, mash or grain mix?
A diet too high in carbohydrates and not enough protein will lead to this problem and with hens being fluff balls of feathers it is hard to tell when they are getting overweight. Unfortunately, hens are like top level athletes in the sense that their bodies are at maximum productivity level.... higher than nature really intended, so it is really important that their diet is balanced to support that level of productivity. Hens love carbs just like we do, so they will eat them in preference to the more healthy pulses. If you feed them scratch they will fill up on that and not eat so much of their layer ration.

The organ that you cut open containing the fibrous material is the gizzard. It is normal for it to be packed tight with food and fibrous material and grit.... hopefully you do provide grit for your chickens..... the gizzard is a very strong muscular pouch where the bird uses grit to grind down any food that is lumpy or fibrous.... basically it performs the function that chewing does for us. It has to be packed full in order to function.

I am by no means an expert, but the large fat deposits and the liver colour are pretty conclusive in my opinion.

 

[Cragg Klefor]

i'm hoping to post photo's tomorrow when i hopefully have a look inside a chicken i lost today. heavy heart right now... but ex-battery i have had for year+ with respiratory illness and god knows what else. posting now to make sure i go through with it. have not done before. won't be so emotional tomorrow and the logic will take back over...i hope.