I am so happy when I hear a positive update on Butters!Butters Update - seems to be slowly improving
No evidence of any bloody pus anywhere yet. Looked at the picture again and the poo part really looks like Butters' poo did, so am heavily leaning on it being Butters'.
I emailed the vet that picture that evening (Friday) and she emailed back on Sunday evening, very interested in what appeared to be "caseous" pus to her, and I think mistakenly assumed it is Butters, but if it is, here's her thoughts:
"....Chickens develop a hard caseous pus as opposed to fluid-like pus in the face of an infection. So if Butters has/had some kind of severe gastric obstruction/impaction, her body might have laid down this hard caseous pus due to the inflammation or infection.
I would not recommend any NSAIDs for Butters (tylenol, asprin, meloxicam, etc.) because these can be very hard on the GI tract and can cause and exacerbate gastric ulcers. Since Butters has evidence of disruption of her GI tract it's probably best to steer clear of these.
I would recommend continuing your care for her as you have been! If you see can more evidence of her passing caseous pus perhaps we could put her on an antibiotic to see if it helps, but again I am hesitant because they can be hard on the GI tract especially if the bird is not eating, so we would probably have to administer it at the same time as a meal."
After weighing her a couple of weeks ago and seeing the few ounces of weight lost, nothing gained, I decided to try to tube-feed her twice a day when possible. On 1x/day she would rally for some hours after feeding and be flagging by the end of the day, and be poorly by next morning. I also felt it's kind of a "fish or cut bait" situation in a way, I don't want to string her along in such an underweight vulnerable state, something else will get her, so let's see what more intense nutritional rehab will do, or not do, for her.
If the vet's hypothesis is the case, then the issue is how much healing is happening, and what scarring might cause. It's also possible that there's an entirely different problem, like a gastric cancer, going on, or that the bloody pus was evidence of salpingitis or another infectious situation (but nobody's poop is looking anything like what happened that day).
I know some people tube-feed three times a day, as @lightm did? There's the issue of how much they can fit in their crop at one time, even when eating naturally, and getting enough calories, something @Shadrach has written about. I'm not inclined to stress her needlessly - she is eating some foods on her own. She is eating goodies of yogurt and sweet corn, and now mealworms, which she wasn't before.
Yesterday she actually ate dried BSF mealworms for the first time, and fought Popcorn for them too (Popcorn backed down, she doesn't try to shoulder her way in anymore like she used to). She was taking real chomps and eating the whole mealworm, whereas before she would look very interested but couldn't actually get anything down except a few crumbs. I haven't seen her eat the crumble feed a lot yet, though I see her at the treadle, and she comes back to the yogurt dish until it's gone. However her crop by late afternoon is not very full. Hazel's is still bigger than what I feel with Butters. Popcorn is such a pig she's no comparison, she's in a different league....
She is fighting me more with the tube-feeding, and besides beating Popcorn back she even lightly pecked at Hazel when Hazel coughed while eating a mealworm next to her - but a quickly raised neck and hard look from Hazel put her in her place. All a good sign. I will weigh her soon I think, and decide on further 2x day or go back to 1x or none....
Rather than stress her with tube feedings could you tempt her to heat higher nutrient feed on her own?
Maybe chick starter?
