HELP!! FAST I think my chicken prolapsed. Final Update

[mychicks-char12]

I have only had my chickens for a few months now. I love having them, but when one prolapsed tonight I was so sad. I hope she will recover and be able to lay again. what can I do to make sure s he is OK? I have her in a small dog crate in the house, where its cool and dark, please give me any information you think will help me!!! char

 

[omeletteface]

Hey everybody, I have just joined up today but have always come to these forums on this website as my first port of call whenever I have chicken related questions. My boyfriend and I are new to keeping chickens and after a problem free year we noticed that one of them prolapsed 2 weeks ago. I came on here right away to see what the experts (you guys) had to say about it. After reading all of your advice and 2 weeks of TLC I am thrilled to say that she has made a a full recovery (fingers crossed it continues) and I'm going to put her back in with her pals next week. This is just a message to say thank you to all of you who took the time helping others with your knowledge, I don't know what would have done without this website and all of your wisdom.

This is what worked for Doris the chicken in case it helps others....

Separated her as soon as we noticed to stop the others pecking at her. Warm bucket baths 3 times a day for the first few days with a table spoon of sugar dissolved in. Dry her off and put sudacrem on it and the area surrounding it. Then for the week after that, poured cold water over her behind with some antiseptic soap in the water (I used one with aloe vera in it) and then dry off the area and squirt honey on all over the prolapse and surrounding skin twice a day- We did this to start to shrink it. When she got really mucky we also have her a warm soapy bath in between. I found that picking her up with her wings firmly by her side and placing her so she was lying on her side on my lap while i was sitting down was the easiest way to pour the cold water on her backside without getting the rest of her, as soon as she was on my lap she relaxed and didn't move, she just lay there which made my life easier. She seemed very comfortable too and even when I finished I had to prompt her to get up. It continued to shrink every time we ran cold water over it. We went in there this morning and found it had popped back in on its own! I was so happy I cried after nearly 2 weeks of worrying. Today I have let her have a peck around the garden on her own for an hour but will keep her in the garage on her own for a couple more days to let her heal as much as possible before going back in with the other 4. I have not washed her today as I don't want to handle her too much but managed to squirt honey onto the vent while she was bent over pecking. Tomorrow I will gently wipe her with a wet cloth and put sudacrem on the vent just to keep infection at bay.

In the first few days I tried to push the prolapse back in, keeping my finger inside for 10 mins afterwards etc but after half an hour if fell out again so I stopped doing this and tried shrinking it which worked. I also tried preparation H once but found that seemed to make it look very red and inflamed so I didn't use it again. For the 2 weeks I kept her in the garage in a cat carrier on a clean towel (refolded it regularly but changed the towel every other day), kept the light off in the garage for most of the time and let her have the light on for 30 mins every time I visited/fed her. There was also a window in there so she had a little natural light all of the time. When I fed her i let her out for a stretch and chatted to her loads to relax her (thank god she couldn't understand me or she wouldn't have been relaxed! "Please get better Doris, you worrying me") lol- The rest of the time I left her to rest in peace. I fed her a lot less than usual to stop her laying- corn, meal worms, mashed boiled eggs with a few drops of cod liver oil on (egg and mealworms are high in protein which apparently helps healing) and some veg put through a food processor (carrot, cabbage, sweet potato kale). She had water the whole time in a little bowl that clipped to her cage door.

The most important thing we realised from your advice was to stop her laying as soon as possible when we realised it had happened, so no layers pellets the whole time and no sunlight at the beginning. She stopped laying 3 days later. After her baths I was letting her have a 10 min peck around the garden to dry off and stretch. Sounds so awful now I have written it all down but I know that it was all with her best interests at heart. I'm not sure if I did anything wrong or I could have done something better but I'm just so glad it worked. door. I know that when she lays again she is at risk at it happening again but I will check her everyday for the next month anyway, probably longer. All in all its been 11 days since she prolapsed.

Thank you once again all. I hope this helps anybody who is reading this and going through the same problem for the first time, don't give up on her xx

 

[omeletteface]

Oh and I forgot to say, during the days since she stopped laying she had egg coloured stuff coming out- don't panic just keep bathing her and keep it clean. Don't pick at it just slosh water around the area in the bath and it will come off eventually. Good luck to those going through this I hope it goes well xx