Question about sour crop treatment

[azygous]

Don't worry, if you killed her, she'd most likely be dead now instead of shaking her head.

 

[Rhyara]

I should've done more research beforehand. The posts I saw just said use a syringe but didn't clarify how until I went looking for what to do when they aspirate. We were very lucky that she didn't get much in her lungs, that she perked up and is doing fine today.
I guess we got enough in her because she pooped a lot last night and her crop was significantly smaller this morning, we didn't take away her food or water overnight so we'll do that tonight to see how empty it is tomorrow morning.
We did order a bird feeding tube kit and should be here Tuesday, looks like we won't need it now but it'll be good to have it in our emergency kit.
We did try to reintroduce her but unfortunately the pecking order was reset and her flockmates chased and pecked some of her feathers out. She seemed surprised and they wouldn't stop when she hid in the corner so we scooped her back up and took her inside. We'll try again in a few days when she has more strength back since her crop has more room to function now.
It's crazy how fast they forget.
She's really vocal today, whenever I leave she honks until I come back.

 

[azygous]

Thanks for the update. I was concerned when you didn't come back to the thread after the syringing issue. It is great to hear the small flushing produced results.

As far as reintegration, the longer she's apart from the flock, the harder it'll be for her. Try easing her back into the flock by letting her spend time in a separate enclosure in view of the others. This is referred to many of us as the 'jail", an all-purpose enclosure to keep a chicken safe without removing them from the flock.

If you do not have such an enclosure, consider adding it to your run. You'll be very glad you did, as it can be used in a pinch for lots of things, including isolating a combative chicken, segregating a sick chicken, or even brooding baby chicks.

Or you can put her in a crate and let the others get reacquainted with her, then let her out of the crate after a few hours.

It's not necessary to immediately isolate a sick or injured chicken. Most of the time, the chicken can be treated without removing them from the flock.

Back to tube feeding. When the kit comes, measure the length of the average crop from beak to bottom of the crop and make a mark on it. It's best to have no more than four inches extending out from the beak to maintain easy control of the tubing while feeding. It it's too long, shorten it accordingly and heat the tip if it feels like it's too rough. You don't want to lacerate the crop tissue inserting it.

Then, nominate one of your more docile chickens to practice on. Just use plain warm water (all fluids or food should be around 100F so as not to chill the chicken). Have the tubing, syringe and fluids set up and ready. Have a towel to wrap the chicken in to confine wings so as to reduce flapping and resistance.

Then hold the chicken on a table or counter close to your body with your weak hand, beak facing your strong hand. Pry open the beak and hold it open with your weak hand while inserting the tubing on the right side of the beak, going along the side of the throat and slightly under the side of the tongue, aiming for the esophagus. The end of the tube should stop short of the bottom of the crop sack. This is why a make on the tube is handy.

Don't be alarmed if the chicken coughs. That is a signal you don't have the tube aimed correctly. Back it out and try again. If you feel resistance, jiggle the tubing until it slides easily into the crop. If you are doing it correctly, there will be no coughing or gagging. Never inject fluids into a coughing chicken.

The chicken may struggle a bit. Just hang on tight and keep the tube in place by closing the beak over it with the fingers of your weak hand until the chicken relaxes. Then fill the syringe and proceed inserting it into the tube and emptying it into the crop. Do not overfill the crop. Usually, you do not want to put more than half a cup of liquid into the crop of an average size chicken. Syringe slowly and avoid emptying the syringe too quickly as it can be uncomfortable. The chicken usually will relax as you tube warm fluids into her. It's a pleasant sensation as the crop fills. When finished, slowly withdraw the tubing, and you're done. Hopefully, you've gotten more into the chicken than on yourself.

Practice is advised so you will not be tense and uncertain when dealing with a very sick chicken during a life or death situation. Once you've tubed once, the next time is a walk in the park.

 

[Rhyara]

Sorry about that I was just watching over her and stressing knowing there was nothing I could do.

We have 2 large dog kennels for them we'll take her and put her in the middle of the run with some food and water for a few hours then switch her out for our most aggressive hen. She incites most of the drama.

Is going from 65f to about 40f okay? I have the heat off in the house to get her colder more gradually. I don't know how big of a temp dip is bad but I keep hearing how heating the coop is bad because of the chance it'll go out and the temp drop will shock and kill them.

Thank you for the detailed walkthrough!

Edit: forgot to mention her crop was fully empty this morning! ☺

Edit 2: Put her in the run. The 4 that are usually in the coop (rescue chickens and the cockerel's favorite) are still in there so they won't get exposed to her, but the 3 active ones she grew up with are following her around the cage. She's not really floofed at all so I assume she's okay temperature wise. We just wrapped the run in plastic this weekend so there's barely any draft. Red there is the bully of them.

 

[azygous]

Forty is balmy to a chicken. They don't even feel that. They get uncomfortable when the temp dives down into the low 20s and teens. Single digits, my chickens all let me know that they think I'm torturing them, so I hang a heat lamp for them to warm their shoulders.

The temperature spread we really need to worry about and be on our toes for problems is when the temperature goes from cool to hot suddenly. Heat is much more of a problem for chickens than cold, even below freezing temps.