Impacted crop now sour- crop not clearing

[Krazikatlady64]

My Barred rock, almost 3 years old, on the thin side, not as heavy as her sister. Had her head back in her neck for a few days. I realized she had a hard, golf ball sized lump in her neck in the morning. The others are fine. I read the great article on impacted crop vs. sour crop.

I treated her for impacted crop - 2 days with scrambled eggs with the docusate sodium 100 mg liquid from the capsules on it. She got 2 capsules 2x a day (2 days). Also 1 tsp coconut oil 3 times a day. Massaging her crop as well. She was drinking and I tried to get her to drink more water. She did not want to eat much layer pellets, which was good, so I tried to supplement that with the softer egg. She loved the coconut oil and egg. I did not remove her from her flock, as I thought this may be more stressful. (Sat & Sun)

Yesterday her crop was not empty in the morning. The lump smaller and doughy. She roosted with her sisters last night, which she has not done in a while. Previously she stayed by herself. (Mon & Tues)

This morning she was laying down on the coop floor, her crop is not empty and the lump is slightly larger and doughy. Down in her crop, not up in her neck. There is noo smell. She is hungry and drank water. Her poop looks normal, but not much of it. (today)

This has been going on for about a week. She acts as if she is doing much better yesterday and today. Acting like her self. I have not let her out of the coop. We have pine shavings and she has water and layer pellets.

There is no vet to consider. I work far away, so not home during daylight much in the week, only weekends. The lump is not hard. Should I continue to treat as impacted crop, or move on to sour crop? Something else to consider?

 

[azygous]

Is she alert? Can she stand? Does she have easy access to grit?

Are you able to feel the crop and get an idea of what material may be in there? Grass or hay? Undigested seeds? Do you recall what she had been feeding on prior to your finding this crop condition?

 

[Krazikatlady64]

She is alert, but lying down. I see now she is also limping on one leg when she walks.
She has been lying down alot. Her crop feels doughy. I cant feel anything in there. Its not hard.

They have been in the coop due to rain. I can only think she had mealworms, feed, oyster shell. She could have eaten pine chips with the mealworms. I don't have grit for them.

It was hard a few days ago, but now just a small dough ball.

 

[azygous]

When chickens can't get outside to forage in the soil for grit, they need to be provided store grit. Get granite grit from you feed store. Chickens will experience crop indigestion without it.

 

[Krazikatlady64]

I got the grit for them. Thank you!

 

[Little Tala Bug]

I don't know if you are still suffering from this problem with your hens, but I thought I'd jump in to say what we did to save our 8 year old hen from sour crop, since we have a similar situation with the vet and had to figure it out for ourselves.

We isolated our girl and made her a special feed consisting of plain biologically active yogurt, virgin coconut oil, grated cucumber, garlic, oregano, and mint.

The logic was that sour crop is an imbalance of yeast, and that introducing live cultures from the yogurt would help re-balance her crop flora and compete with the yeast overgrowth. The coconut oil was for softening any potential impaction, decreasing fungal growth, and adding much-needed calories to her diet. Cucumber was to add water and electrolytes, and the mint, oregano, and garlic are said to help decrease fungal and pathogenic activity in the crop.

We fed her this special mash every day for 7 days, along with gentle massaging of the crop, and the sour crop cleared up completely. She absolutely loved the food, which was good because she wasn't eating or drinking anything else until we started her on it. We had to raise the food up a little bit for her to be able to access it because she couldn't bend down to eat very well with her crop so swollen.

I hope you don't need this advice any more because your hen is already feeling better, but it is handy have in the future since all of the ingredients are relatively easy to obtain from the supermarket. We used a grater to incorporate the cucumber and garlic, but shoving it all in a food processor would work just as well.

Good luck! x

 

[Krazikatlady64]

Thank you for the reply. I'm going to keep it for future reference. She is doing much better, but I think she hurt her leg getting off the roost as she has been limping. I don't see any obvious injury and she does get up and eat and wabble walk. I added more roosts to make it easier for them to see down and up the same directions (parallel to each other). Also a small low light night light incase something happens at night. Once or twice I'd find one had moved to an odd place in the coop in the middle of the night.

All the hens love the grit. They seem much happier. Cuda's leg is getting better, so I'll keep monitoring. Thank you all for assistance again. Her crop is fine as of now.

 

[amysarah01]

Is she alert? Can she stand? Does she have easy access to grit?

Are you able to feel the crop and get an idea of what material may be in there? Grass or hay? Undigested seeds? Do you recall what she had been feeding on prior to your finding this crop condition?

I have almost the same problem with my chicken right now. She is loaded with hay/grass. Baseball size, gave her metamucil and papaya enzyme yesterday. Crop went down a little, but now very sour and it was not yesterday. Very squishy and I swear you can feel every blade of grass. Can you give me some suggestions? I know I can't get that hay/grass back through her mouth and I dont know what else to do. No chicken vet available.

 

[azygous]

Almost always when grass and hay are clogging a crop, crop surgery is the only way to resolve the issue. The stuff simply will not dissolve by the usual methods. I've given precise directions to members here to perform their own surgery, and most have done it successfully. Would you be interested in this?

 

[amysarah01]

Almost always when grass and hay are clogging a crop, crop surgery is the only way to resolve the issue. The stuff simply will not dissolve by the usual methods. I've given precise directions to members here to perform their own surgery, and most have done it successfully. Would you be interested in this?

Yes, please. Yesterday when I got home it was as hard as a rock and had changed shape. I dont want her to suffer and I dont want to lose her. At least this way I have a shot at saving her. Thank you.