Advice on Sick/Lethargic Chicken (poop pictures included)

[Wyorp Rock]

@Wyorp Rock beat me to this by just a few minutes, but it doesn't hurt to hear it from both of us.

I think we are all typing at once!
Good advice as always Carol!
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I'm in agreement with @sylviethecochin that a crop issue would be the number one suspect. Other clues are the array of fresh produce your hen eats, and the other clue is that she's confined indoors. The last clue is her poop. It shows no food is likely being processed by her body.

You say the hen has access to grit and calcium. Would that be oyster shell? Is that what you are providing as grit? Even if she has proper grit, it's still possible to get impacted crop after eating too much fiber. The way to verify a crop disorder is to check her crop in the morning again before she has anything to eat or drink. If, as I suspect, her crop is still full and firm, you will need to treat her for impacted crop. If her crop is full, but soft and spongy, you'll need to treat for sour crop. An anti-yeast medicine is necessary for this. (Miconazole or Nystatin)

I like to use coconut oil since it's easy and safe to administer with very little danger of aspirating the oil. Very serious impacted crops can take an entire day to clear if this is her issue. I recommend a teaspoon of oil at a time with very gentle massage for five minutes. Wait an hour and repeat.

Do this as many times during the day as necessary to break up the mass and you feel it go down. After three sessions of oil and massage, if the crop isn't budging, then I administer a capsule of a non-stimulant stool softener, one more teaspoon of oil, let it work for half an hour, then massage the crop.

It's very, very important that after the crop clears, the hen is provided with granite grit for adult chickens. While oyster shell seems solid, it's water soluble and won't work as grit if that's all she's been getting. Granite grit is found at all feed stores and it has the properties necessary to grind up food in the gizzard. (Think sharp garbage disposal blades.)

Along with granite grit, offer yogurt and/or boiled egg and plenty of fresh water until she gets her appetite back.

As an aside, calcium and grit consumption varies from chicken to chicken according to their individual needs. Therefore, it's a wise practice to offer these two things free choice so the individual can regulate their intake to satisfy their own individual needs.

The best way to do this is to have a special small container for grit and another for oyster shell (instead of powdered or liquid calcium). Mixed into the food, there's a risk the chicken will get either too much or too little, which can end up causing problems. Too much grit can cause impacted gizzard. Too much calcium and cause kidney damage.

 

[eidle123]

Morning Update: Crop is full and very solid.

 

[Wyorp Rock]

Morning Update: Crop is full and very solid.

O.K. Go back and read POST#4 by Azygous. Then read her article here
https://www.backyardchickens.com/ar...w-to-know-which-one-youre-dealing-with.73607/

Don't offer her any food, snacks, grit or oyster shell, she doesn't need anything else "solid" added to the crop. She's not going to starve, you have to get the crop cleared moving before she can process food anyway.
She does need to have water available - always have water.
I'm like Carol (@azygous ) I like to start with giving 1teaspoon coconut oil and massage to see if I can get what's in there broken up and moving.
Refrigerate/freeze the oil, then break it into little chunks. Usually the hen will eat that right up. They seem to love coconut oil.

I'm sure Carol will be on later to give her input as well. Start working on the crop and let us know how it goes. A crop issue can take several days to resolve, so don't give up.

 

[eidle123]

We ended up giving her about 1/8 cup of electrolytes and massaged her crop. It went from solid to very malleable and I could effeminately feel some larger chunks in there. We have removed her food and frozen some of the coconut oil for her to try and eat this morning.

We will repeat this step this evening (after work). I am hoping her crop will start to pass some of the food, but we will just feed her yogurt and electrolytes for dinner.

 

[Wyorp Rock]

We ended up giving her about 1/8 cup of electrolytes and massaged her crop. It went from solid to very malleable and I could effeminately feel some larger chunks in there. We have removed her food and frozen some of the coconut oil for her to try and eat this morning.

We will repeat this step this evening (after work). I am hoping her crop will start to pass some of the food, but we will just feed her yogurt and electrolytes for dinner.

It's good that you were able to feel what's in there and it's not quite so hard.

She does need to be drinking so she doesn't get dehydrated. Electrolytes are fine.
1 tablespoon yogurt for dinner sounds o.k. too IF, IF the crop clears, then offer her a little wet feed.

 

[rebrascora]

Hi. I am sorry to see that she is so ill. I would be prepared for the worst as once they go off their food, they are often near the end and it is difficult to bring them back, especially when they have lost a lot of their body stores and they have become emaciated. I would say that if veterinary treatment I possible, that might be best if you can find someone with avian experience. She would probably benefit from IV feeding since she has lost so much weight and her poops suggest her digestive system is shutting down.
Is her tail always twisted like that or is it a recent occurrence or just because she is in the corner of a box. I have concerns that there is more going on than just an impacted crop. Her eye looks odd and the blindness in one eye and possible wry tail make me think of Marek's Disease. Was her eye injured in the hawk attack or did she go blind just afterwards? Marek's can also cause crop impaction due to development of tumours in the digestive tract. All you can do is treat her symptoms though and you have been given good advice on that.
I too would reiterate that grit and oyster shell need to be provided separately and not mixed into food and a balanced diet is really important to hens because they have been selectively bred to be productive beyond that which nature intended, so providing the nutrients her body needs to stay healthy and produce eggs via a formulated feed is very important. Anything else you give them means that they eat less of the chicken feed and their nutritional intake can become unbalanced. We all like to treat our chickens but it needs to be restricted and should not be more than 10% of their daily food intake..... one heaped tablespoon of treats throughout the course of the day when they have a healthy appetite would be generous. I appreciate that she has not laid for 6 months and you say she has never moulted but to me that indicates that there is an imbalance in her system which may be dietary or related to an internal problem.

Good luck with her and if you do seek veterinary assistance, please let us know what happens because we can all learn from these sad situations.

 

[eidle123]

Update: She is still alive and very sluggish. We gave her some more coconut oil, electrolytes, and greek yogurt via syringe. She is very thin and her crop is still full even after trying to massage the food down. We are just trying to get calories into her so she can try and recover and pass the obstruction. I can definitely feel a larger chunk of something in her crop. Her poop over night is still very liquid, but there was a few solid chunks of poop in her coop when we got home from work. I have attached a picture of it. It was a little full of pine shavings, and VERY stinky.

@rebrascora Her tail was a little crooked in that picture, but it is not always. The blindness was a 100% result of the red-tail hawk. See attached picture from the back. That is also why her feathers are a little light on her head.

We have since added a separate container of grit and a separate container of oyster shells for the laying hens.

 

[azygous]

I suggest you try the stool softener plus oil and massage.

 

[Wyorp Rock]

Update: She is still alive and very sluggish. We gave her some more coconut oil, electrolytes, and greek yogurt via syringe. She is very thin and her crop is still full even after trying to massage the food down. We are just trying to get calories into her so she can try and recover and pass the obstruction. I can definitely feel a larger chunk of something in her crop. Her poop over night is still very liquid, but there was a few solid chunks of poop in her coop when we got home from work. I have attached a picture of it. It was a little full of pine shavings, and VERY stinky.

@rebrascora Her tail was a little crooked in that picture, but it is not always. The blindness was a 100% result of the red-tail hawk. See attached picture from the back. That is also why her feathers are a little light on her head.

We have since added a separate container of grit and a separate container of oyster shells for the laying hens.

I agree with @azygous stool softener plus coconut oil.

In the poop photo - there is something "pinkish" and crinkly underneath, is that just flooring/bedding or was that with the poop too?

 

[eidle123]

@Wyorp Rock Lol. That pink is my hand and the crinkly underneath is a plastic bag I used to take the poop out of her crate.

It is reassuring to see you guys are so detail orientated.

I have seen some youtube videos about trying to push her impacted crop back up to try and clear it. What are the thoughts on that process? I am not to keen on it, but if it will save her life, I am willing to try.