Sour crop

[shell3]

sounds like your doing everything right, thats what i had with bombie , the mushy feeling and grity, what happened was i tried for three days to empty her and couldnt, when i eventually manage it what came out was 'gloop', i dont know if you have kids but what it reminded me of is the stuff that comes in those alien eggs the children have! really thick and almost moldable. it scared the bleep out of me when it came out! just kept coming and i thought she would choke, it came out in one long blob and splashed into the loo! but once that was out, thats when she recovered and the crop returned to normal, i was still feeding mushy food , she gained weight and was doing great. now i think i have the same gloop in there but despite my brave efforts to squeeze it out, i just cant manage it. im going to keep trying as im convinced if it comes out it will bring all the feathers with it cos its so gloopy. the vet whos on tomorrow is not the vet ive been seeing, he is confident to do the op if needs be but i really want to get her through the weekend and back to the regular vet on monday. i want to avoid surgery if possible. ive massaged her crop for an hour tonight, hopefully moving the feathers around enough to allow some food through but who knows! she was happy for me to do it so it cant do any harm, in fact she fell asleep!! lol she still has her collar on and is locked in the coop with the others for the night, thats where shes happiest, i will check on her first thing, probly try to empty her before i feed her and then make a decision of what to do. work starts on the new coop and roof ect first thing so when shes better we can eliminate as many problems as possible that might cause another problem.
shes bright and lively thus far so that keeps me positive.
i hope to hear and be able to give good news tomorrow xx
'edit' forgot to say i did do the epsom salt flush yesterday, she did poop a lot of runny pooh but the crop remained the same.

 

[pwand]

My hen hates if when I massage her crop. Yours obviously enjoys it, . Yes the goop feel out was the same. Like the squishy toys and it splat into the toilet. There's a small amount I can't seem to pass. Hopefully you will have success with removing the feathers with the next vomit. I bet she breaks them off as she ate them. Keeping my fingers crossed. I've revamp my coop so many times, my husband cringes. I'm the one who builds and designs it, he helps with the lifting and holding.

 

[Sunflowergirl]

Hello All!
I know y'all have had lots of information to look at. Hopefully I won't give y'all overload sharing this. It really isn't that long. However, I have really learned a lot from the lady, Kathy Mormino, who writes this blog. One thing I was surprised at was the Chicken Vet here says to not give ACV as the environment is already too acid. I kinda think the copper sulfate MIGHT be what gives you a more basic environment. Anyways, here is the link:

http://www.the-chicken-chick.com/2012/04/answers-from-chicken-vet-on-impacted.html

Keeping my fingers crossed for y'all!!!

 

[pwand]

I came across that link before. There has been different ideas how to handle this, makes it confusing. I stopped giving it to my hen. I was wondering if I'm interfering more than I should. I also read yogurt wasn't good for chickens as well. I stopped that as well and decided to give her feed mushed with water. I put her out with the girls a few days ago and share a small bowel of yogurt with the two other hens and they had bad diaharea. They cleared up after about 12 hrs. .

Tonight with an update, putting my hen out today with the girls and allowing her to eat the crumble seems to helped her, I brought her back in tonight and check on her a few hours later and her crop is almost empty. Probably moving around helped. She still is puffy. It looks like we turned a corner. .

 

[shell3]

thanks everyone for the links and info. i will read them all tinight. been busy on the run today,we hit a few problems with the roof but its now. set us back time wise thou so havnt started new coop yet and still a lot of flooring to be removed. weve lost light now so will be back out first thing.
pwand-so glad to hear shes doing better keep on with the nystatin. hopefully it will be completely empty in the morning. then just take it slow carry on with the mush for another week then start making it thinker over the second week and if the crop empties each morning slowly mix in the normal food. fingers crossed for a full recovery xx

well bombie no better. i emptied her this morning and got very runny liquid out and qite a few feathers but couldnt get it compleyely empty. she was spluttering and it scares me everytime that ive killed her! i hate doing it!! have fed mash every two hours with vitimins mixed in and crushed meal worms crushed in to powder,sprinkled on top for added protein due to moult! shes looking quite pitiful her comb and wattles are small and pale. she is poohing and has a good apitite. i emptied what i could tonight got fair bit out and more feathers but again she gets stressed and makes funny noises!it freaks me out and i cant empty completely . shes in coop with the others with collar on so hope for some improvement tomorrow.
bad thing happened this morning thou,the string the vet used to tie the collar on has disapeared! i cant find it in the coop! i so hope she didnt eat it!or any of the others ate it!!

 

[Bogtown Chick]

Shell: I'm so glad you have pwand on here going through stuff with you together. Set backs or days without improvement are tedious and disheartening for you to be sure...but it's good you have somebody dealing with this stuff to help bounce off what works for them and what doesn't. So so glad for that for you and Bombie. I'm learning so much following you both. It's for sure a complicated process this sour crop isn't it?! OMG. I dread the idea of having to deal with this myself. And hope I won't have to But I believe in preparing myself with knowledge. Thank you all for sharing.

 

[shell3]

Thanks bogtown x it always makes me smile seeing your posts, i remember im not alone! lol my husbands sick of hearing about the chickens!
we start on new coop today, im hoping they will roost rather than sleep in the woodchip so as to discourage the eating of it!!
ive removed most of the wood chunks from the run (still going but back is killing!) and we have a new roof . bombie is much the same today some food must be going through cos she did the biggest pooh ive evr seen this morning!! lol. crop is still bloated and i couldnt get any thing out when i tried to vomit her. plan is tomorrow to pick up tube and syringe from vet and either try to convince him to help or if not just bring them home and try myself. i plan on syringing in warm water and then sucking it back out to try and clear the blockage, im assuming the feathers are the blockage but i could be wrong i guess, im hoping to maybe suck feathers up the tube but wether thats even possible i just dont know. i cant think how wide the tube will be as ive never done this before. im scared , i wont lie about that, i dont want to do it, but im more scared of loosing her by doing nothing. its all i can think to do now before i have no choice but to take the surgery route. my biggest problem with surgery is that she gets another blockage after, cos then what , she cant have surgery every time this happens !! i really want to find a way to treat her myself.
shes out in the run today with the others ive removed all the flooring i can and im feeding them all mush. ive had to remove the collar as it was making her neck very red and i feared it would cut in to her skin, not sure it prevented her from plucking any way. i havnt seen her pluck today, just when they fall naturally she is eating them! she has all new quills growing. im trying to keep a good supply of mushy food availible, i realise she is stretching the crop but i think thats better than eating bedding ect which she will do if i try to withold food to allow the crop to empty. rock and hard place!! it is good to have pwand to bounce ideas off and hear whats working and not though of course i wish she didnt have this problem at all. the support keeps me going
pwand- how you getting on , has crop emptied completely?

sfg- thanks for the link some good info there, its hard to know what to try but having all the info makes it so much easier to make informed decisions, never worry about overloading me with info, theres no such thing , all info is very much appreciated. xxx

 

[pwand]

Shell: don't put wood chips in your coop. She will probably eat them. Right now it's the bare floor. I have concrete slabs for my floor. I have been going out often scooping out poop. I have read others used wood pellets, looking at that after we get through this.

What you could look at doing with Boombie is fill her crop with water and i believe some baking soda, massage her crop and then make her vomit. This would be less traumatic. Our vet gave us a tinny tube that wouldn't even suck up seeds, however, great for putting water into the crop, some has used aquarium tubes for sucking.

I was a bit worried yesterday, had my hopes were up the previous night and then in the morning she didn't empty out, I vomited her again. It's morning here, just checked on her and her crop is closely emptied. Last night she was full, but it felt tight as if muscles are working,I left her alone. She seems better. It seems to help leaving her with the girls. How much Nystatin do you give the hens. I read 3cc morning and than 3cc at night. That's what I have been giving her. I have antibiotic in the water and the other two hens have watery diarrhea, My hen with crop issues is starting to sneeze. Side affect probably of the antibiotic having diarrhea.

 

[shell3]

pwand- the coop i have is tiny and i have to put woodchip in or they would be sleeping on the metal floor and in their poop! were half way through the build of the new coop and when fhats finished they will be able to roost at night then im thinking a bit of laminate flooring and no wood chips. laminate just for easy cleaning but thoughts on that are welcome. i agree i want rid of the woodchip.
sounds like your girl is improving i realise shes not 100% yet but improvement is promising. the crops emptying mostly so thats the right direction. could the sneezing be from the vomiting? is it after you empty her or all the day? bombie sneezed a lot after the vet vomited her but shes ok now.(sneeze wise) think they get a bit up their nose or something.
yes i did wonder if the tube would be tiny! ill try the baking soda. if not it will be surgery this week i cant remember the doseage for nystatin ill try to find the bottle and post later. my girls had 'splatty' poop caused by eating the mushy food could it be that? coop wont get finished today! loosing light fast now its five evening here! but if she has surgery i need that coop done and woidchip gone! argh not enough hours in the day!! think shes not eating so many feathers when she has constant access to food but now shes stuffed her crop to the max! id rather sje eats food than feathers but wish she had some common sense!!

 

[Bogtown Chick]

Shell and pwand I like the sounds of your posts. I sense progress, In your birds and Shell also in your new Set up for Bombie and her girlfriends. How wonderful for them. Lucky lucky birds, to be sure.

Shell i like your plan on getting the vet to flush or you doing it. Any thought on doing alka selzer vs. the baking soda? I guess I just visualize the effervescense bubbling off the yeast or blockage and moving stuff around down there so it moves along or is able to be removed by vomiting. Almost helps chemically (the same as baking soda--neutralizing any sourness) as well as physically(bubbling rubs off junk on the inside lining of the crop) you know what I mean. But also I think of the gases filling the crop but maybe the birds can release that too. IDK.

Thinking out loud again.

How did you do finding a small shirt for Bombie. I think for comfort that might be a good idea. Not too tight so she can fluff a bit underneath for warmth if she needs. If you figure somehting out you'll have to post pic again. Just for my own Bombie fix. LOL.