Impacted crop now sour- crop not clearing

[khind]

Thanks so much!

 

[MarlaMac]

I have a question. You stated no anesthesia necessary. I notice that people don't numb for bumble foot. Certainly they feel pain. Is it that pain meds are too hard to administer to chickens, or are they too dangerous to chickens? Just curious. Thanks.

 

[khind]

She should be getting about a fourth of a cup of food per day, so offer her frequent feedings until she has had that amount. Let her have more if she demands it.

For about a week, no rough foods that would require grit to digest. So keep it to soft

Oh my gosh... Her output (stools) seem to be getting smaller, and more comprised of liquid and urates than solid since yesterday (and they were tiny yesterday). I fed her at about 8:30 p.m. (2 hrs ago), and put her in her crate for the night. There's no stool at all. I don't even know if there's liquid output.
When I just went to check on her and what her stool looked like, she was ready for more food. Her crop is a little larger than it was before. Food may still be sitting in there.
I started her wearing a crop bra when I first noticed she was impacted a couple months ago. Took it off when the crop became enormous because it wasn't doing anything (while waiting to find someone to do the surgery).
She had stitches yesterday. I wonder if it would be safe yet to put that crop bra back on... It looks like she might need it again...
I just spoke with the vet who did her surgery. He happened to be the 24-hr emergency vet on call. He paused a while and said that if a stool took 3-6 hours, that would be reasonable. That sounded so odd. It doesn't seem like my experience with my flock at all, although it's true I can't see inside their GI tract to know exactly which foodstuff is exiting their body when...
Oh, and I also told him she did a real lot of wriggling when I fed her tonight. That's how she was when she was impacted. So the bra may be even more warranted.

 

[azygous]

I don't see that the bra would hurt anything as long as she doesn't try to scratch it off and rip out the stitches.

 

[azygous]

I have a question. You stated no anesthesia necessary. I notice that people don't numb for bumble foot. Certainly they feel pain. Is it that pain meds are too hard to administer to chickens, or are they too dangerous to chickens? Just curious. Thanks

Yes, chickens feel pain. However, they do not thrash and fuss and make a big deal of it as do humans. Therefore, they generally do not require anesthesia since they are calm and quiet and do not fight you. Pain killers are toxic to chickens so we don't use those, either.

 

[MarlaMac]

Yes, chickens feel pain. However, they do not thrash and fuss and make a big deal of it as do humans. Therefore, they generally do not require anesthesia since they are calm and quiet and do not fight you. Pain killers are toxic to chickens so we don't use those, either.

Thank you!

 

[khind]

I don't see that the bra would hurt anything as long as she doesn't try to scratch it off and rip out the stitches.

I agree. I just edited my last comment as well, to add part of a conversation I just had with the vet who did her surgery.
Also, just before I phoned him, I went to check on her. There was a tiny stool with lots of urates. The tiny stool is green. I told him about that, as green stool never looks good (unless they're eating plants, which she's not). But then I mused whether the medicine might change her stool color, and he said yes it could. I'll watch and keep my fingers crossed...

 

[khind]

I don't see that the bra would hurt anything

Buffy has had a recent poor development. Her crop was huge all over again by Thursday (2 days ago). I've consulted with 2 different vets. I'm going to start a thread about what's going on.

 

[Bori]

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

Hello there, i found this as i was searching for answer i just wondered if you think i should do the same cos my hen is sitting on her eggs, 1 hatched 2 days ago, since then she does not wanna go out and seems like a frog living in her the way her crop/neck makes these weird sudden movements. Yesterday i massaged her crop and vomited, then felt better, now had a little boiled egg yolk and started the same. Just gave her olive oil. Crop is not hard but i can feel seeds in there. But she had mo seeds for 2 days. Could be also the lack of movement? First time mum, so i dont know thanks, Bori

 

[Little Tala Bug]

Hello there, i found this as i was searching for answer i just wondered if you think i should do the same cos my hen is sitting on her eggs, 1 hatched 2 days ago, since then she does not wanna go out and seems like a frog living in her the way her crop/neck makes these weird sudden movements. Yesterday i massaged her crop and vomited, then felt better, now had a little boiled egg yolk and started the same. Just gave her olive oil. Crop is not hard but i can feel seeds in there. But she had mo seeds for 2 days. Could be also the lack of movement? First time mum, so i dont know thanks, Bori

Does the crop smell sour? I would just leave her with some water and maybe a bit of live yogurt and let her finish her hatch and intervene once she is off the nest. I'm not terribly experienced myself so maybe worth asking a more established member.