Are Impacted Crop and Molting related?

[lisababes]

You had your hand in her crop?? was this during the surgery, or how did you ever get your finger down her throat - I can't even open my hen's mouth to feed oil! I have to drip it on her beak and wait for her to swallow. She's a pretty tame one (she'll hop into your lap

if you're sitting outside and she's bored), but super squirmy when it comes to her head!

I like that there's so many WI people on this thread

Thanks for your advice, I'll see how it goes. I also found this thread to be useful if I need to do the operation eventually. Luckily I have access to sterile blades, etc. Would just need sutures. https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=229796&p=1

 

[Avalon1984]

I used fishing line and disinfected it. It’ll come out this weekend. I did not stick my finger down her throat, I had it in her crop after I sliced it open. Just make sure you have somebody holding her and put a towel over her eyes so she goes sleepy time. You will have to carefully navigate your way around in there and slowly pull stuff out. Start with tweezers and once you have enough out, you can use one of those small decorative spoons (gross, I know) to kind of scoop the rest out. I stuck my fingers in there to get larger masses out. I also had a bottle of distilled water around to clean the wound as it tried to get dirty while I pulled stuff out. Make sure you get everything, especially on the lower part where there must be an impaction. When I did the sutures, I did not put a know into each stitch, I kind of just went along and put a knot on where I started and when I was done. It held up find but I won’t know how great it worked until I remove them this weekend. Mine was an emergency so I didn’t have time to get suture material. If you can, I’d go with that instead. There’ll be some blood here and there so you can’t be squeamish. After surgery, give her plenty of electrolytes and rest.

And disinfect everything as best as possible.

 

[florida lee]

if she is eating you can try some small pieces of bread soaked in olive oil, my ate it right up. If she has a little waddle you can get a grip on, a little tug should open her mouth.

 

[speckledhen]

The worst crop issues we've had here have been when the bird is in a hard molt. Their systems are already depleted and if they get hold of the least bit of moldy anything, their crops just seem to shut down. Lost my only Speckled Sussex to impacted crop during a very hard molt, even after surgically emptying her crop. Lost another hen when her crop just quit working-it wasn't impacted, but she got hold of something moldy in the feed (was in the bottom of the bag, straight from the co-op, which had a flood and missed this bag, I guess)and the crop wouldn't work at all. We surgically emptied it and she seemed better briefly, then took a turn for the worse.


Generally, any small issue becomes a bigger one when the bird's system is depleted, as it is during a hard molt.

 

[lisababes]

Been 5 days in isolation (and probably a week outside before I noticed) and no progress, really- she still is perky though. I've gone back and forth between just oil, and really feeding her when I start to feel bad cuz she's obviously hungry. Sometimes she gets pellet food, tomato mash, apples, a little scrambled egg, various oils on food and dropped on the beak.

Crop is still baseball sized; hard in the AM, but can be squished up a bit by me. When I do feed her, she poops within a few hours, and its usually identifiable as what I recently fed. As if the food is just going around the huge ball of crud in her crop. I was massaging hopign it would slowly pass, but I dont think it is going anywhere.

The first couple days before I was feeding her much, she'd pass some hay-filled poos, but very small ones. This was back when she was having mostly water poop. Now its just whatever I feed her comes out. Today we got a smelly cecal too. I really don't want to do crop surgery... do you suppose i can just let her exist like this until absolutely necesarry? She's still isolated so I can watch her poo/eating.

 

[Avalon1984]

Mine did that too. It seemed like the oil bread was passing through despite the crop issue but the actual impaction would not. If it hasn’t passed in 5 days that is not good. I don’t know about keeping her like that since the stuff in her crop is going to start decomposing. I would think this can lead to all kinds of side effects.

 

[lisababes]

Avalon84 - how is your bird doing? You just did the surgery a couple weeks ago right? Was this your first time? I'm not too worried about doing it - just about preventing infection/healing afterward... so I keep waiting.. since she still seems happy enough. I might let her loose and see what she eats on her own for a couple days. Then maybe it will somehow resolve w lots of food passing through, or else if it gets big; then I'll have to cut her open.

 

[Avalon1984]

Quote:
My bird is doing fantastic. I reunited her with the other chickens and she is back to being her normal self. She has some weight to put back on but that seems reasonable given the trauma of the surgery. The surgery was my first time and the first cut just freaked me out because it bled a little bit, but once I got going it was getting easier and easier. I did not use neosporin for the wound, I used Scarletoil which is something I have for the horses. It comes in a spray bottle and I treated the wound with it 3x daily for the first 72hrs, then 2x daily for 1 week and then only once. It healed up beautifully and her crop is back to functioning properly. How is the color of your chickens comb? That may indicate how she feels like. In any way, I would not wait untils he shows signs of not feeling good. The weaker she goes into a surgery like that, the bigger the chance she may not survive the trauma. Just a guess. Either way, keep us up to date.

 

[seminolewind]

I've had a few impacted crops and yes, they were on hens that were molting. My last one did have a lump in her crop like sill putty, but I massaged it several times a day.

 

[lisababes]

seminolewind: so did it eventually go away on its own?