I thought it was internal laying

[zazouse]

Breed: bard rock
Age: 4.5 years old
Diet: free range and flock raiser free choice.
I noticed day before yesterday my barred rock hen was standing in a squatting position at the feeder so i kept and eye on her, she was eating good, color was good but she looked like she needed to lay an egg, buy this morning she still looked great and was eating but squatting at the feeder and looked like she was rather uncomfortable to walk so i checked her, she felt swollen in the rear and it was warm to the touch, i decided to cull her figuring she internal laying which i have seen get bad and infection sets in and they suffer, so i did not want this to happen to her.

When i cut her bottom cavity open to see what was going on , water came pouring out, pure,clear non smelling water, i ain't never seen nothing like it. I am talking maybe a half a gallon at the very least poor " poor henny"
There was an egg in the unpper cavity which i think all that water was pushing on her organs and the egg and she could not lay.
I just need to know if anyone has seen anything like this before?

Thanks for the impute
ZAZ

 

[terryg]

Clear liquid is often from "ascites." This is not uncommon in very young broilers (because they are designed to grow so quickly and their internal functions are stressed) and in older hens like yours. When you feel what seems like a water balloon in your hen's abdomen it is sheer guess work as to what causes it. You only know after a necropsy. I had two hens, same age, same breed who both had the squishy bottom. Necropsies showed that one was an internal layer (and the abdomen was filled with whites and yolks) and one had ascites - clear liquid. Ascites is caused by system failure and there is no cure. It is good that you culled her before she suffered further. I have a blogpost about the kindness of euthanizing here:
http://hencam.com/henblog/2012/06/the-kindness-of-euthanizing/

 

[speckledhen]

Also, ovarian carcinoma will cause fluid like that to build in the abdomen. You'd see little polyp-like growths all along the intestines and oviduct. I've had a couple of those cases, too, both in older hens.

Terry and I have apparently had lots of the same experiences.

 

[zazouse]

Thsank you both for you replies, learn something new every day sometimes good sometimes bad.
Thanks for the link, i have put down many animals in my lifetime even my own dogs when it was time and it never gets easy, i had to cull a chick that just was not thriving no matter what i did for it, it just cheeped in my hand with that how do you say, like purring chick style, my heart kept having an argument with my good sence till i did the deed, i hate that

 

[terryg]

SpeckledHen- Yes, almost every older hen that I've looked inside has had those polyps, often with many other issues (I'm sure you've see the impacted infected egg material both inside and outside of the repro tract.) Can you point me to a medical reference? So frustrating that all of the necropsy how-to videos and tutorials only show healthy young birds. So little research done on older, not-commercial flocks!

 

[speckledhen]

Gosh, Terry, I posted a reference for the symptoms of ovarian carcinoma not too long ago here and I don't recall off-hand where it was. There was an excerpt from the website of a nature center/sanctuary with a veterinary staff and the description fit what I had found in an older hatchery hen to a "T". I'll see if I can find the write-up.


Found this I posted when my old RIR hen, Reba, died back in December:


Quote:

 

[terryg]

This is excellent. Thank you. I do know that ovarian cancer is so prevalent in laying hens that they are the prime animal that researchers use to study human cancer treatments. The one thing that I don't agree with in the above quote is the draining. These are seriously diseased animals. I've seen hens starve to death because of the intestinal blockages. Keeping them alive by draining is just prolonging suffering. What's astounding is how long a hen can keep ticking and go through the motions (I've seen hens fake eating). They don't show that pain in their eyes, "I'm ready to go" look until they're way past the point that other animals would show it. I don't ever want a hen to starve under my watchful care again.

 

[terryg]

BTW, that link doesn't work, I'm looking but can't find it online.

 

[terryg]

Found it!
http://www.farmanimalshelters.org/care_buckeye.htm

 

[speckledhen]

I just copied it from my post back in Dec. Thanks for fixing the link. It must have changed.


You are correct about one thing. Draining doesn't fix anything. All it does is make the hen more comfortable for a short period of time. We did that with Olivia on several occasions-I'm sure you've read the thread. She was the most resilient hen I've had other than my Ivy. Their overall excellent health kept them on top of it until the darkness that was stalking them just caught up with them. At least when Olivia died, she was free of most of her excess fluid and skipping around like a pullet again, but the poisons from inside were just all over her sweet little body, I guess.