Removed THREE screws from crop YIKES!! UPDATE GOOD NEWS

Well I broke some hinges on my coop door so I took them out and set them inside of a lid cover on the top. Next thing I know they are GONE. It happened so fast, my chickens werent even outside, but two of them flew to the top while I had it open for all of 2 minutes to add some shavings. So I went and got my level with the really strong magnet, checked everyone and sure enough Apricot was sticking to the magnet BIG TIME. I lost a chicken from a screw not too long ago so I knew I had to at least try to get it out. I talked my neighbors into helping me, Grace is a nurse and had some numbing spray that she brought down. I made a little tiny slit and were able to get not one but THREE screws out. We put a lot of betadine on it and some 3m steri strips and now Im just praying that it will heal up. She was so calm thru the whole thing. I was going to keep her inside tonight but she wouldnt settle down so I took her outside to sleep with the other ones.I also gave her a big dose of Baytril that I had left over from my avian vet. I will get up really early to see how she is doing. I had to try something, once she swallowed them it was gonig to be too late, especially with THREE. Oh my gosh, I feel so stupid. I checked everyone else with my level and no one else had one, tho I am missing two screws which I am pretty nervous about. I went thru my coop with a magnet that I bought expressly for picking up little nails and screws off of the ground, like they use on a construction site. Anyway, I hope this works, I'll post later and give an update.....

Aww, bless you for helping her. I do think she would have met an untimely demise had you not intervened on her behalf. Please keep us posted. I pray everything heals nicely.

Thank you so much. I just went back outside and brought her in for the night. I set up my brooder cage again for her. I was just worried about her getting a bunch of dirt on the little incision that we made.

wow Kim! you amaze me...! I think you are truly awesome to take that step of home surgery! I follow your "weirdest things your chicken eat" thread and remember reading about your Annie... and you are the reason why I was keeping such close track of every piece of hardware when I built my new enlosure a couple of months ago! you're a wonderful chicken Mama, I really hope Apricot has a speedy recovery!

Wow thank you so much Cheeka, you guys are SO encouraging. Well good news, Apricot is doing VERY well.
I went back outside and dragged my brooder cage inside and brought her inside for the night. Whats really surprising is how calm she was thru the whole thing. She actually did a lot better than I did. Anyway, I put some Blu Kote on it last night and tonight I looked at it again and its already healing! God is good! I put some of that stuff called New Skin on it tonight, I ran into a lady at the store that says her avian vet uses it on her parrots. It worked pretty good on my elbow too when I cut down to the bone on the nice little rain gutter that I put on my new chicken coop. Im SO glad I decided to make the call and get the screws out, scary as it was, if I would have waited it would have been too late. And yes, I CANNOT stress enough how important it is to be EXTREMELY careful when you are doing any type of work that involves any kinds of little parts. Man alive, I feel SO stupid that this happened again.
I was so paranoid I went outside twice last night after 10 pm and did a sweep of the chicken run with the magnet that I bought from Home Depot for picking up screws in the yard, and woke up my chickens again to do a 'scan' on each of them with my torpedo level. They were like "what the heck are you doing waking us up and petting us with a magnet in the middle of the night?" Im thinking a magnet is a really great thing to have on hand to check your chickens if you suspect they have swallowed something such as a screw. I have a lot of torpedo levels on my fridgerator from work ( I use them while Im bending pipe Im an electrician) .I bring them home when one of the bubbles get broken, they have these really neat ones that have those super strong 'earth magnets'. Anyway I am commited to an entirely different and very strict policy when it comes to working around my chickens. Even when I went to put some of the New Skin stuff on Apricot, she tried to eat the applicator! Good greif. Also I couldnt have done this without my neighbors helping me, it pretty much took all three of us to do it. Ive had so much chicken drama this year!

Yaaaaaay!!! she's so cute! I love a happy ending

WONDERFUL to see that update, thank you for letting us know! *waves pom-pons for Apricot!*

where exactly did you make the incision I don't see it?

Its underneath her feathers, right on the front of her crop. The incision was only about 1/4 of an inch, thats all I needed to get the screws out. I used the magnet to locate exactly where the screws were, you could actually see the shape of the screw thru her skin when I put the magnet up to her crop. This is also a picture of her before she ate the screws. Its already scabbed over, Im glad I didnt have to make the incision any bigger, as I had nothing to do stitches with and I dont know if I could do that or not. Heres a newer picture. RATS sorry its sideways, I dont know why my stupid iphone does that.......