Please help me with my duckling!

[DuckyDonna]

We need @casportpony or maybe @Pyxis can help here!

 

[Miss Lydia]

@Pyxis yes!

 

[DuckyDonna]

Can you get an updated picture?

Please, a picture would be good

 

[TomCahalan]

Are you still giving treats? Those are the problem right now, so make sure that you aren't giving anything other than poultry feed, water, and grit.

Birds, like mammals, need to chew their food. However they don't chew using their mouths, they chew using an organ called the "gizzard". Gizzards don't have teeth, so in order to chew the bird swallows rocks, which act like teeth. The rocks eventually grind down to sand, so you must always supply more rocks (which is called "grit").

When the bird is chewing in its gizzard, it might still want to eat more. So it has a storage pouch between its mouth and its gizzard, called the crop.

My theory is that Bit's gizzard has some cucumber in it, and Bit is trying to chew it, but has no grit in his gizzard, so he isn't making any progress. Since his gizzard is busy, any additional food went to the crop. Even if Bit is eating grit now, it might go to the crop instead of proceeding to the gizzard, where it is needed. I am not an expert on this, so I might be wrong.

 

[DuckyDonna]

Are you still giving treats? Those are the problem right now, so make sure that you aren't giving anything other than poultry feed, water, and grit.

Birds, like mammals, need to chew their food. However they don't chew using their mouths, they chew using an organ called the "gizzard". Gizzards don't have teeth, so in order to chew the bird swallows rocks, which act like teeth. The rocks eventually grind down to sand, so you must always supply more rocks (which is called "grit").

When the bird is chewing in its gizzard, it might still want to eat more. So it has a storage pouch between its mouth and its gizzard, called the crop.

My theory is that Bit's gizzard has some cucumber in it, and Bit is trying to chew it, but has no grit in his gizzard, so he isn't making any progress. Since his gizzard is busy, any additional food went to the crop. Even if Bit is eating grit now, it might go to the crop instead of proceeding to the gizzard, where it is needed. I am not an expert on this, so I might be wrong.

what you are saying does make sense but I don't know how all this works either. I am hoping that pyxis will join in. She knows a lot like casportpony.

 

[Miss Lydia]

That cucumber would have been in there quite awhile now Tom?

 

[DuckyDonna]

That cucumber would have been in there quite awhile now Tom?

so if there was no grit does that mean it just sits there?

 

[Pyxis]

A picture will help. Ducks don't have true crops like other birds such as chickens do. Instead, their esophagus can expand to accommodate holding a lot of food. Pictures would help determine what's going on and to see where the lump is, etc.

I don't know if cucumbers would cause this. Usually, food getting stuck in the 'crop' and not being able to pass is due to a bird eating something that is not food, like twine or hay that get tangled into a big ball and form a large blockage.

 

[DuckyDonna]

Hey @WVduckchick can you help out here?

 

[Miss Lydia]

https://wagwalking.com/bird/condition/air-sac-rupture. What about this @Pyxis