Impacted crop

[Banana01]

How does her crop feel in the morning before she leaves the perch? If it is not empty in the morning, there may be blockage in her system, from grass or worms or something else.

The morning is a good time to massage the crop to loosen the food too. I give water with a syringe and massage to loosen the food.

 

[RubelliteRose]

Also know that sour crop may not smell in the early stages. We just treated one of our hens for what we thought was an impacted crop. It was large and protruding at night and only somewhat smaller in the morning. We put her in a cage in the house and treated her with the coconut oil and massage the first day - 2 tsp coconut oil followed by 10 min. massage repeated in 30 min. for 3 rounds of treatment. Her crop at night was flattened, but not exactly empty and everything settled to a golf ball sized mass by morning. The second day we tried the Dulcolax treatment -2 Dulcolax capsules and a 10 min. massage wait 4 hours and repeat. We also syringed water into her beak to make sure she was drinking enough- gently pushed water to the outside of her beak so she could drink what she wanted without aspirating. We had the same results - flattened crop at night, golf ball mass in the morning.
She still did not have a sour crop smell, but we started the Monistat 7(miconazole) treatment - 1/2 inch of cream 2 times a day for 7 days. We let her stay with the flock the entire time of this treatment. Her crop went back to normal around day 4-5.
In addition to the excellent article above, we also found this article very helpful https://www.backyardchickens.com/ar...w-to-know-which-one-youre-dealing-with.73607/
Hope your girl feels better soon!

 

[Stephanie8806]

UPDATE: went up to get the chickens water this morning, and I caught Rhonda and massaged her crop. I immediately smelled the sour smell from her beak and heard her crop gurgling. So now I know for sure it’s sour crop.

 

[Shezadandy]

UPDATE: went up to get the chickens water this morning, and I caught Rhonda and massaged her crop. I immediately smelled the sour smell from her beak and heard her crop gurgling. So now I know for sure it’s sour crop.

Ah (y)uck!!!

No to using an Epsom salt bath. You'll just have a wet chicken to dry off at the end. Maybe she'd enjoy it anyhow, but as far as benefits to resolving the sour crop, unfortunately not.

I would separate her now that she's progressed to sour crop, that means what's in there is literally rotting and whatever little she does eat to seem normal to her friends is just adding to the back-up. Hopefully she's a friendly crate bird. I have a few that look at it like their own personal hotel suite complete with a fluffy bed and dust bathing area- hopefully she's one of those!

An alternative to a pen on the outside is a sectioned off area inside an already safe perimiter. I still bring them in at night - even the ones that don't like the crate- to a crate for my own peace of mind. Having a spot for all your mentioned uses is so much easier- mine has been a literal life saver!

 

[RoyalChick]

UPDATE: went up to get the chickens water this morning, and I caught Rhonda and massaged her crop. I immediately smelled the sour smell from her beak and heard her crop gurgling. So now I know for sure it’s sour crop.

At least you know. Also sounds like the massage is doing something so I would keep doing that to help get stuff moving along in addition to treating the sour.
Hope this all works out for you and her.