Performed crop surgery!!

[chickeepoo]

We had a hen that had to have the surgery back in February- she was up the next day, healed without infection, and was laying again in 2 weeks. I think using Super-glue to close the incisions and rinsing with saline/patting dry throughout the procedure helped the good outcome. A speedy recovery to your hen, and good for you on your surgery job!

 

[Minniechickmama]

Thanks. I am sure my husband hopes we don't have to do that again

 

[Quillgirl]

I have one that has continued to go back and forth after surgery. She healed well, but tends to overfill her crop and it slows, then I have to put her in isolation until it empties again and she poops normally. I guess the stretching caused her crop to lose tone and now it tends toward emptying slowly. I'm hoping over time she'll improve her ability to move food more quickly and the slow crop will phase out.

The things we do for these birds.

 

[Minniechickmama]

I am wondering the same thing. I am hoping it is a shrinking organ, like a stomach that will shrink. If I keep her on a restricted diet and don't feed her too much, I hope she will regain the tone to her crop to digest like she should.
Thanks for the input Quillgirl.

 

[Minniechickmama]

Day 3- She is still alive and seems to be acting completely normal, even pecked my hand last night when I reached in to check on her incision. I gave her plain yogurt yesterday and she devoured it, but her crop took until today to go down. She is pooping though, so maybe something is going right now. The area around the incision feels hard about an inch around. The fluid is not there any more though, so I am taking that as a good sign and there is good color. I am going to give her more yogurt and then tomorrow some egg. We will see then if things are moving through before giving any crumbles.

 

[Quillgirl]

Mine is almost 3 weeks post op. She does well when the food intake is monitored, and poorly when put in the coop and left to her own eating habits. I ended up having to do a round of antibiotics and that seems to have helped the slow moving crop a lot. It's possible the hen got some bacterial infection after surgery and the slow movement of food created a nice culture medium. I hope she has not decided it's best to live in the A/C and be a house chicken... She was down to 2.5 lbs before surgery and now is a more healthy 4 lbs and eating voraciously. Time will tell.

 

[Minniechickmama]

Okay, it is Day 7 for my girl. She is kicking butt. Her crop is clearing she is scarfing down crumbles like nobody's business. I think she is going to be fine! Woo Hoo!

Now I fear I have another one with something going on. Is this crazy or what???? 3 pullets with sour crop? I talk to people around here that have had chickens for years and have never had this show up, and I have 3!?!?!?!? It seems grass is the the main thing not going through, but I don't know why. They free range all day and have plenty of grittiness available to them with the gravel around the coops with plenty of fines and in-betweens, so I don't understand why they keep having this show up? The feed is kept dry too.
Anyone have an idea why I am seeing this?

 

[Minniechickmama]

Tomorrow would have been 2-weeks since I performed the surgery on her, but alas, I had to put her down today. I had let her out a couple of days ago to range with the rest. She was doing so well. But this morning I picked her up to just give her the once over, and she had developed an infection under the skin where the crop had perforated. I don't know if it was the stitches that gave way or what, but it was one big stinky mess. I decided for both of our sakes, it was time for her to go. She was already about 9-months old and had not produced and egg, and she would be a few more months of recovery before she would give me an egg. So, may she rest in peace.
The other girl, on the other hand, who I did not need to surgically intervene, is out with the rest of the flock and is getting on fine. She is shy around the rest and comes making her goosey noises by me when I go out to feed and so forth, but I don't see her crop filling up like before, so I think she is going to be fine.
I would do the same thing again if I needed too, but I think I am going to keep a close watch on all my birdies and make sure none get as bad as she was. It is all part of the learnin'.
Thanks everyone who gave me support on this endeavor.
Theri