My chicken is barfing yellow liquid non-stop and has liquidy yellow stool. She's having trouble breathing. Why can I do???

[Barnette]

Please help! Her name is Fiona and she was acting lethargic this morning but is throwing up yellow liquid. Her crop is swollen and squishy. She seems to be having trouble breathing. I need help quickly.

 

[CoopBoots]

I'd start by trying to prevent aspiration where she may breathe vomit in. Here's a thread that covers some vomiting tips (nevermind the bits about inducing vomiting, but helping her position herself and cleaning the beak and nostrils seem useful for your situation.)

Post in thread 'hen moving neck weird and not eating!!' https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/hen-moving-neck-weird-and-not-eating.1629291/post-27824485

@azygous @Wyorp Rock

 

[Barnette]

Okay, I'm cleaning her up and applying VetRX

 

[CoopBoots]

I'm no expert but hoping it is a crop issue, as there's pretty specific ways those can be treated. You'll get better input soon! Anyway, if she smells really bad it's more likely to be sour crop rather than impacted crop. I don't know if poisoning can cause vomiting (I don't think vomit works the same in chickens as it does in us) but is there any chance she got into anything by accident, like unusual plants or prey like mice?

 

[azygous]

She likely has a yeast infection with an underlying issue of slow or blocked digestive tract causing the yeast to colonize the crop. She probably isn't so much vomiting, as humans and dogs do, but the crop is overflowing, can't move contents down the digestive tract, so she's struggling to keep the fluid out of her airway.

VetRX won't help. That's like Vicks when we need a little relief from a stuffy nose. Your hen is way past that. She's very sick, and it will take a lot to try to fix this.

I'm going to suggest you do something we tell our fellow chicken keepers never to do because it's very risky. But this is an emergency.

Take your hen outside where you can hose off a mess. Place her on the ground between your feet and lift her up a few inches. Then tilt her whole body forward at about a 45 degree angle. This will partially empty her crop so she can breathe without aspirating liquid. This will also make her feel a little better.

Do you have any women's vaginal yeast cream on hand? If not, send someone to the store for a tube of it. It's called Miconazole Seven Day. Squeeze out an inch of the cream and get it all into her beak. This will start to fight the yeast in the crop.

She likely has an obstruction farther down the digestive tract, and we'll address that soon enough. Just do what I suggest right now.

 

[Barnette]

I'm no expert but hoping it is a crop issue, as there's pretty specific ways those can be treated. You'll get better input soon! Anyway, if she smells really bad it's more likely to be sour crop rather than impacted crop. I don't know if poisoning can cause vomiting (I don't think vomit works the same in chickens as it does in us) but is there any chance she got into anything by accident, like unusual plants or prey like mice?

Thanks! Her vomit smells very bad so hoping it's sour crop. The chickens free-range all day so they could have found anything. I also propped the barn open for a few hours so I suppose she could have found something in there. We do not use pest poison or herbicides.

 

[Barnette]

She likely has a yeast infection with an underlying issue of slow or blocked digestive tract causing the yeast to colonize the crop. She probably isn't so much vomiting, as humans and dogs do, but the crop is overflowing, can't move contents down the digestive tract, so she's struggling to keep the fluid out of her airway.

VetRX won't help. That's like Vicks when we need a little relief from a stuffy nose. Your hen is way past that. She's very sick, and it will take a lot to try to fix this.

I'm going to suggest you do something we tell our fellow chicken keepers never to do because it's very risky. But this is an emergency.

Take your hen outside where you can hose off a mess. Place her on the ground between your feet and lift her up a few inches. Then tilt her whole body forward at about a 45 degree angle. This will partially empty her crop so she can breathe without aspirating liquid. This will also make her feel a little better.

Do you have any women's vaginal yeast cream on hand? If not, send someone to the store for a tube of it. It's called Miconazole Seven Day. Squeeze out an inch of the cream and get it all into her beak. This will start to fight the yeast in the crop.

She likely has an obstruction farther down the digestive tract, and we'll address that soon enough. Just do what I suggest right now.

TYSM! I'll do that today!!

 

[azygous]

Your hen appears she may have egg yolk peritonitis (EYP) from the runny yellow poop. In other words, massive infection. That's the worst case scenario. If she rebounds with the yeast treatment, it may be an obstruction that we can do something about, worms comes to mind.

What I advise next depends on how she responds to the yeast treatment. Do it two times a day for seven days.

 

[Barnette]

Your hen appears she may have egg yolk peritonitis (EYP) from the runny yellow poop. In other words, massive infection. That's the worst case scenario. If she rebounds with the yeast treatment, it may be an obstruction that we can do something about, worms comes to mind.

What I advise next depends on how she responds to the yeast treatment. Do it two times a day for seven days.

OMG that's not good. I'll get the yeast cream today. Do I need to bring her to the vet?? There's a poultry vet nearby but it's really expensive. Will she live??

 

[Barnette]

Okay we are bringing her to the vet today. She does not look good and if she also has EYP than I'm really scared.