Equate miconazole monostat for doughy sour crop now lethargic HELP

[Yellow321]

Stands up to eat a couple bites and then lays back down Hasn't pooped yet since 6am. It's 12pm. I gave straight molasses at about 7am. Then syringed a bunch of water. Still no poop . I've also noticed that she doesn't poop much in the laundry room by herself. I put her back outside and she poops all over with everyone else.

 

[ChicNmom]

Stands up to eat a couple bites and then lays back down Hasn't pooped yet since 6am. It's 12pm. I gave straight molasses at about 7am. Then syringed a bunch of water. Still no poop . I've also noticed that she doesn't poop much in the laundry room by herself. I put her back outside and she poops all over with everyone else.
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First thing....SHE'S ADORABLE!!!

A few of the hens that have spent time in my basement rabbit hutch would try to hold their poop until I took them outside. Then it was a poop fest!


I did the molasses flush once. I did it at bed time and by morning there was a giant poop pile. And I put on gloves and went through it to find the problem. The crop was almost normal. But it wasn't something like straw that could absorb moisture and swell up. So I don't know how much time that would take to move through

My hen with the straw ball in her crop wasn't blocked further down the line. But after a while her crop did smell sour. It felt a little doughy but I could feel the straw fibers and some grit.

Try not to get discouraged. Keep working at it. It's a lucky chicken that has someone try so hard to help it!!!

 

[Yellow321]

Could you tell if a decent amount of poop came out of her? Or if the molasses might have flushed the water out of her....


@Eggcessive & @azygous

The sour crop is most likely due to a straw impaction. Would you still wait until the Miconazole treatment is finished?

@Yellow321
Personally I would just keep her in the laundry room by herself.

@ChicNmom

I just brought her back into the run with her sisters for a supervised visit and as predicted, as soon as I put her down she shot out a poop (its now 12 pm - hasnt pooped in the laundry room over 5 hours!) Same poop though: all clear liquid with a bit of dark green. No solids. No straw. I gave the molasses straight syringed in her mouth around 7am. Then a lot of dropper fulls of water. Been watering her all morning. I've given her probably about 30-40 cc/ml of water and will continue to all day. She has pecked a little at some boiled egg yolk and some watermelon and some cucumbers. Not much at all though.

She's currently wishing she could dust bathe with her sister. She tried but no energy, so laid back down

 

[SmiYa0126]

Do you have any stool softener?

 

[Yellow321]

UPDATE: It's now the end of the day and I believe the Miconozole is getting rid of the alleged yeast. Her crop doesn't feel so squishy (full of yeast I assume) and now I can feel almost exactly what's in there: a pile of grit and probably scratch at the bottom of the crop, and then some straw in the rest of it. I'm massaging and trying to break it up. It seems broken up enough - it doesn't feel like a hard ball wad - but for whatever reason, it hasn't moved on to the gizzard. Maybe the gizzard is impacted as well so the crop is just a neverending holding tank with no place to go.

No solid poops or any brown in poops at all today (same as yesterday). Only clear liquid and little bits of green. No straw or anything else has come out, even after all the coconut oil for 3 days, stool softener yesterday, molasses + water today.

She eats cucumber and boiled egg yolk, with a few bites of watermelon here and there. She mostly goes for the cucumber and egg throughout the day though. Are there any other foods I could offer her during this time?

I can hear bubbles gurgling in there and feel bubbles during crop massages - sometimes it makes her burp. She won't eat plain greek yogurt so I forced 2ml this evening, hoping the probiotics might help with the fermenting?

I gave a dose of Nutridrench orally this morning. Then fresh water dropped on beak all throughout the day. She's such a good girl letting me drip while shes laying down. I can usually get in 5-8 cc's at a time. Also gave a few cc's of Nutridench diluted in water this evening.

She still just wants to lay around with her eyes closed.

Fingers crossed for some improvement when I see her tomorrow morning.

I hope I'm not speaking too soon since it's the night before, but she and I have kept her alive long enough for her vet appointment on Tuesday. I'm hoping they can help us further. And without me having to take out a second mortgage! lol

Thanks everyone for your tips and advice. This is my first go with having chickens and it has been much harder than I thought and I'm only 4 months in! Sheesh, it was easier having dogs and cats lol

 

[Yellow321]

Do you have any stool softener?

I gave that yesterday morning and evening. It didn't do anything for her. I just posted an update a minute ago above!

 

[ChicNmom]

The crop might be slowly emptying and moving through her system. The doughy yeast has to go someplace after it's killed off.

If she didn't have a bunch of straw in her system then maybe there won't be a lot of poop because she hasn't eaten much and what she has eaten has been soft foods.

Can you feel the opening where the crop empties? I don't know if her crop is too full for that and it might push the crop contents into her throat if it's still too big. But that space can get clogged up. It feels sort of like the divot at the top of your sternum between the clavicles.
It just occurred to me that some straw could be blocking that.

Hopefully the vet will have a good plan.

 

[Yellow321]

The crop might be slowly emptying and moving through her system. The doughy yeast has to go someplace after it's killed off.

If she didn't have a bunch of straw in her system then maybe there won't be a lot of poop because she hasn't eaten much and what she has eaten has been soft foods.

Can you feel the opening where the crop empties? I don't know if her crop is too full for that and it might push the crop contents into her throat if it's still too big. But that space can get clogged up. It feels sort of like the divot at the top of your sternum between the clavicles.
It just occurred to me that some straw could be blocking that.

Hopefully the vet will have a good plan.

Yes I've tried to feel for that spot and I think I can feel it. I've tried to gently pull on that area thinking the same thing, that maybe some straw is stuck in there. She's still the same this morning.

 

[Yellow321]

UPDATE:
Took her to the vet yesterday.

As the Vet felt around her body she found a large mass behind her left leg. She doesn't know what it is but with her being so young she didn't think it was cancer (but didn't rule it out). She also mentioned Mereks, but isn't sure, and also didn't rule it out. She took a sample of the mass and didn't see any cancer cells under the slide, but did see a lot of white blood cells which indicated infection somewhere. She suspects it's a swollen lymph node? But she doesn't know. She said the digestive tract backing up could be a secondary to something else going on, possibly this big mysterious lump on the leg. She said let's treat for that leg lump first and gave Amoxi and pain killers that I'm to give. The hope is that that being resolved will get the digestive tract moving again.

She did an xray and her gizzard is totally full of...something, she said. It looks like a bunch of grit to me. Bandit was probably stuffed with something (styrofoam and straw will not show on an xray but I know she has eaten both in the last few weeks) so she kept eating grit thinking it would move things along? And now it's all jammed up? Who knows. If you look at the xraw closely, there's even grit in the tube leading to the gizzard and the intestines leading out of the gizzard. Which there shouldn't be. Her digestion has completely stopped. She's getting so skinny

I'm still giving miconozole to keep the yeast build up in the crop. Her crop doesn't have much yeast in it at all anymore so that's at least something. There's still the small bit of straw and grit in there, but thats because further down in the gizzard there is no movement.

She eats boiled egg yolk and cucumber and watermelon each day on her own. So she's still trying . She won't eat any of her regular grower crumbles, even if I put water in it.

I'm not giving up on her yet! Unless these antibiotics don't clear up whatever is bothering her and the obstructions have to be surgically removed. I don't think I will go the gizzard surgery route. Much too expensive, and very invasive being so deep into the body cavity. So I'm trying to mentally prepare myself for possible euthanasia if these antibiotics dont start doing something over the next 10 days.

 

[SmiYa0126]

@Wyorp Rock @azygous @Eggcessive does this x ray tell you anything?