Our chicken just died, can they have heart attacks?

[dehowery]

We have a silver Wyandotte that had a pasty butt. So we caught her and had her upset down in my lap with her head laying over my knee not quite touching the floor. We were cleaning her vent and when we finished I brought her back up to let her loose and she was dead. My husband thought she might have passed out but we can't feel or see her breathing. Was she so stressed by this that she had a heart attack and died? Her comb looked red , her vent looked normal other than the build up of chick shit. Any ideas ?

 

[WhiteWyan]

It's possible she was already weakened from being pasted up and all. How old?

 

[ChickenCanoe]

They can definitely have heart attacks. I've had 3 roosters die from heart attack over the years.
However, in your case and a bird with a feces issue, I suspect it was an intestinal infection of some kind or complications related to such.
The only way to know for sure is to send the bird to your state or nation poultry diagnostic lab for a necropsy and lab work.
What state are you in?

 

[AmazingRachel]

If you hold them upside down, they go into kind of a trace/go to sleep. I've never heard of it actually being the cause of death.

 

[dehowery]

They can definitely have heart attacks. I've had 3 roosters die from heart attack over the years.
However, in your case and a bird with a feces issue, I suspect it was an intestinal infection of some kind or complications related to such.
The only way to know for sure is to send the bird to your state or nation poultry diagnostic lab for a necropsy and lab work.
What state are you in?

Thank you I have done that once already with 3 other birds... I would guess that maybe something else was really really wrong because of the feces issue and she just passed away. I was getting ready to worm the flock and noticed her butt.