Ok friends, the short story of the necropsy is I was doing it against the wishes of the family and thus rushed, took exactly 1 photo then abandoned that idea. Not because I don’t wish to document but because I was hurrying since dh was waiting literally on the other side of the kitchen door.
He was already asking if I “was done yet” when I had only just set things up on the little table and remembering how to operate the Tare weight feature on my kitchen scale so I could know how much Margaret weighed (in the box) she was in, because she was stiff and I couldn’t get her body to balance on the small glass circle.
DH took my words “I’ll just take a peek to find out” very seriously and made me promise to close her up afterward “for burial”.
Prior to her death, Margaret-Tate was the top of the pecking order. She was a beautiful bird with a gorgeous bright red comb and glossy iridescent black(green) feathers in the sunshine.
She was the first out of the coop in the morning, last one in at night and called to her flockmates when she decided it was time to retire for the night. She had a voracious appetite and the first to appear at treat time.
I’d seen her in one of the nest boxes with Dolly in the box next to hers prior to her collapse.
It was after Dolly had sung the egg song that dh went out to gather their eggs.
He ran up to the house opened the door and yelled in , “Stace! Help! I think Maggie’s dead!” Then slammed the door.
She was indeed just a step outside the nesting box having not laid her egg.
I was very sorry I didn’t have a helper for the necropsy, or at least more time. It was cold as heck in my garage with poor lighting and no running water. I didn’t think to bring a basin of clean water in for hand rinsing which would have made taking photos a lot more practical. A few water bottles would have some in handy as well.
Also I would have done it sooner ....or later. Because we waited until after DD had left for work a few hours later.
Attempting to perform a necropsy during rigor mortis definitely made the process more difficult.
She weighed
5 pounds 4.8 oz.
I don’t know where that falls on the scale for an Australorp Hen. But when I carry them around the yard, each of my birds are a comfortable arm load.
When I opened her I am ashamed to say, she had an ALARMING amount of firm fat in her lower abdomen, it was nearly an inch thick and rose halfway up her tummy.
*Last night I was searching images online and came upon a blog post titled sudden death of a hen on a site called
www.hencam.com.
The photo of the fat in the abdomen of that hen looked exactly like mine did.
Later I discovered that this same bright yellow fat also encircled the top one third of margarets heart and globs of it were elsewhere.
She had a fully formed normal sized egg just a few inches from her vent. And lots of varied sized yolks beyond.
Her gizzard was full of grit, oystershell bits and other organic material in the process of breaking down and appeared normal.
There were no worms to be seen in her intestines. No parasites on her body.
Her feet and legs were in excellent condition. Her mouth and throat looked normal.
A large flat clot approx 4 inches long by 2 inches wide was sort of “stuck” to the outside of her liver which was not firm at all like the kind you eat, but quite soft and mushy and fell apart imstantly when I handled it.
The eat an all flock with oyster shell and grit on the side. Free range for bugs and other goodies in the yard and get an ample supplement of herbs which I grow year round.
Dh adores giving them treats (mealworms and the occasional handful of scratch grains) after work and says it’s better for stress decompression than coming home to an adult beverage.
I suppose I need to examine whether to allow them treats at all, since now I’m worried that my whole flock is doomed to die from what I’m sure is fatty liver disease, but I know that would rob DH of his enjoyment of spending time with them after work.
Final impression almost certainly:
Margaret-Tate bled from the liver while attempting to lay her egg. Perhaps she had some pain and left the nesting box but never got farther than a step or two.
I'm just so thankful she survived; she is my baby.
