HELP! Impacted Crop

[GLDCHICKEN]

My husband and I have a Dark Brahma that has had an impacted crop for 3 days. we have kept her isolated, massaged the crop several times a day for 5+ minutes at a time, given her oil and water in a syringe several times (water more frequently than the oil), and we have withheld most food. I have given her an egg and some yogurt because it has been so many days and I was hoping that would get things moving maybe. I think the impaction is stringy grass.

I have not tried to turn her upside down to empty the crop. I have read mixed things, and this is a hard impaction, not sour crop, so I am not sure what to do. additionally, we are about to leave for a vacation for 10 days. At what point should we cull this bird? I absolutely dont want to do this prematurely, but I also dont want to have a bird suffering and slowly starving without intervention while we are away.

as of now, she seems happy besides the hard crop. she has an appetite, eats when I feed her, is not looking lethargic, and even laid an egg yesterday. Poops are very wet, which makes sense because of all the water and minimal soft food.

What is the best option at this point?

thank you in advance for your help!

 

[FarmerGirl101]

Do not make her vomit, this can be very dangerous. You've done everything good so far. Does she have free access to grit? If it is grass then she needs grit to help break it down. Here is an article that has another treatment to try for an impacted crop.

https://www.backyardchickens.com/articles/another-remedy-for-slow-impacted-crop-problems.79871/

 

[Chold05]

You can try feeding her a half- 1 tablespoon of coconut oil then massaging her crop. I would do this 3x a day for several minutes. Massage gently in an upward motion with the pads of your finger tips to try and break up the mass. It especially helpful to do this in the morning before she eats.

Don't allow her to free range or eat anything other than soft foods. You could offer her wet mash, in addition to scrambled egg, or raw egg yolk via syringe if needed.

 

[Anon112]

Bumping this thread because I have what I think is impacted crop. She didn't go up on the roost the other night, and when I felt her crop in the morning it felt like there was a ball of playdough in there. Did gentle upwards crop massage last night and this morning. Got some coconut oil after work so this evening she got about a teaspoon and some more crop massage. It felt like the "ball" in her crop was about 1/3 smaller than yesterday.

Just carry on with this routine, right? During the day I have her in a quarantine pen (inside the run so she is still around her flock) with some mash and fresh water. Aside from not roosting, she's acting very normal in terms of walking around, the way she's holding herself, etc.

As long as it seems like the "lump" is reducing in size there's no need for other measures, correct?

 

[Chold05]

Bumping this thread because I have what I think is impacted crop. She didn't go up on the roost the other night, and when I felt her crop in the morning it felt like there was a ball of playdough in there. Did gentle upwards crop massage last night and this morning. Got some coconut oil after work so this evening she got about a teaspoon and some more crop massage. It felt like the "ball" in her crop was about 1/3 smaller than yesterday.

Just carry on with this routine, right? During the day I have her in a quarantine pen (inside the run so she is still around her flock) with some mash and fresh water. Aside from not roosting, she's acting very normal in terms of walking around, the way she's holding herself, etc.

As long as it seems like the "lump" is reducing in size there's no need for other measures, correct?

That's a great sign it felt smaller! Yes, keep doing what you're doing until it's gone.
It can take awhile- so be patient.


What do her droppings look like? Can you post a photo?
Is she molting by chance?

I ask because I had a hen that would get crop issues every time she molted. The food was super slow to digest, a hard lump in the crop, strange poos.. I spent thousands on vet visits and medication. I pro-actively implemented the coconut oil and crop massages and put her in a crop bra every molt and it helped tremendously!

 

[Anon112]

That's a great sign it felt smaller! Yes, keep doing what you're doing until it's gone.
It can take awhile- so be patient.


What do her droppings look like? Can you post a photo?
Is she molting by chance?

I ask because I had a hen that would get crop issues every time she molted. The food was super slow to digest, a hard lump in the crop, strange poos.. I spent thousands on vet visits and medication. I pro-actively implemented the coconut oil and crop massages and put her in a crop bra every molt and it helped tremendously!

Yes all of my Delawares are going through an absolutely wretched molt. On top of that, they've all had diarrhea that "cycles" (have it for a week, don't have it for a week). I just had two of them down to the vet (sadly just a day before discovering the impacted crop, else I would have taken that girl along!) and the vet thinks it's an environmental bacteria issue. (We're waiting on test results before deciding on a plan of action because it will probably involve a combo of short-term medicating and me making some changes like swapping out their roost branch and doing a deep clean of their roosting area).

This girl's poops are definitely the worst. Just very liquidy and dark.

Now that the Delawares (5 hens out of a flock of 27) are all in middle/late-middle age, I probably need to start doing more preventative care for them like crop massage.

Thankfully she absolutely LOVES the coconut oil I purchased, so she eats that as a treat then gets her crop massage.

I'll keep up with my routine and post again if it seems like the lump is getting bigger or if she develops any other symptoms.