TheOddOneOut
🌧️🌧️🌧️
This winter, a gorgeous Dominique pullet of mine, Salt, fell ill with fluctuating crop issues that eventually evened out into an overfilled, oversized crop that didn’t drain regularly. She was uncomfortable and constantly adjusting it. Her list of symptoms:
She was a beauty in the summer. Really just a lovely bird.
But as she seemed to slowly get worse as it became colder, she didn’t look so great.
If that wasn’t enough, she molted out her wings and tail. So any short flight was likely very difficult. She could not properly soften her leaps down from the roost, I think- and this cause her crop to stretch as it was thrown forward with every “woomph” down from the roost. So it became stretched and overfilled.
On good days she had color in her face and her posture was good.
But most of the time she was displaying all the symptoms from the list.
I knew stuff was wrong, but I didn’t know exactly what. I knew it was her crop, but I assumed it was just slow. Not all stretched and blocked.
She was skinny and slow. I felt like she was slowly kind of wasting away.
I tried everything that was suggested. Massages, vegetable oil, no sticky foods...it didn’t really help. We ended up scheduling a vet appointment.
They were wonderful. Did a great job listening to us and assessing her. They were the ones who figured out her crop tissues were stretched out to the size of a tennis ball or more, and they took action. They called us and informed us of their plan.
They kept her overnight, and put her in a “crop bra“ to let it drain and have the crop shrink. They fed her and watered her and gave her her own enclosure.
They sent her home with another crop bra on, feeding instructions, and love.
I might be dreaming it, but her posture and the color of her comb and wattles seem better already.
I hope this helps anyone with a bird experiencing crop issues!
She was a beauty in the summer. Really just a lovely bird.
But as she seemed to slowly get worse as it became colder, she didn’t look so great.
If that wasn’t enough, she molted out her wings and tail. So any short flight was likely very difficult. She could not properly soften her leaps down from the roost, I think- and this cause her crop to stretch as it was thrown forward with every “woomph” down from the roost. So it became stretched and overfilled.
On good days she had color in her face and her posture was good.
But most of the time she was displaying all the symptoms from the list.
I knew stuff was wrong, but I didn’t know exactly what. I knew it was her crop, but I assumed it was just slow. Not all stretched and blocked.
She was skinny and slow. I felt like she was slowly kind of wasting away.
I tried everything that was suggested. Massages, vegetable oil, no sticky foods...it didn’t really help. We ended up scheduling a vet appointment.
They were wonderful. Did a great job listening to us and assessing her. They were the ones who figured out her crop tissues were stretched out to the size of a tennis ball or more, and they took action. They called us and informed us of their plan.
They kept her overnight, and put her in a “crop bra“ to let it drain and have the crop shrink. They fed her and watered her and gave her her own enclosure.
They sent her home with another crop bra on, feeding instructions, and love.
I might be dreaming it, but her posture and the color of her comb and wattles seem better already.
I hope this helps anyone with a bird experiencing crop issues!
The crop bra is also quite stylish, no?
