What is this bulge sticking out of my duck's chest?!?! HELP!

[farrah3]

There is a strange HARD bulge on her front. It is yellow-ish & appears to have some dark red (tissue??? meat????) on it. It is a little larger than a quarter. There is no other trauma to the duck. We just noticed it last night. There do not appear to be missing feathers in the region. It does not appear to hurt her at all, I can touch it and she doesn't even seem to notice.

I soaked her in warm water last night, cleaned it with peroxide and put Neosporin on it (non-pain killing kind). There are no maggots in the area & it does not smell bad at all.

Crested Duck about 1 year old. She's a bit plump, but is not showing a weight gain or loss at this time. She has been sitting on a nest of eggs for a couple of weeks in straw. It's extremely hot in our area. The males were attacking the females, so we removed them from the pen about a month ago. This duck was constantly attacked by the boys & had most of her neck & head feathers pulled out.

None of the other ducks have anything like this. She is eating and drinking, swimming and grooming her feathers as normal. Poop is normal.

This is our family's favorite duck, any help would be greatly appreciated. We do not have an avian vet in our area. Thank you for any advice.

 

[Debs Flock]

Welcome to BYC. I've sure never seen anything like that. You provided great info in your post above. Thank goodness there are no maggots & she seems fine other than this growth. I'll tag some other members that have lots of duck knowledge.

@casportpony
@Ravynscroft
@Miss Lydia
@Amiga
@WVduckchick
@Pyxis

 

[Nyla]

It could be a tumor or a organ that seeped through a wound. Does it appear to be a wound? Do you see separated tissues around the bulge?

 

[farrah3]

It could be a tumor or a organ that seeped through a wound. Does it appear to be a wound? Do you see separated tissues around the bulge?

I'm not sure if it's a wound---I didn't notice blood anywhere (but she might have washed it off in the pool). There was a crack in the corner of one of their pools a few weeks ago (we have since thrown it out & replaced the pool), so maybe she cut herself on that crack???

The soft pink belly skin appears to separate around whatever this bulge is, but then it is attached to the edges of it. I was thinking it was some sort of muscle/tissue/organ that pushed through a wound & then the skin re-attached itself to the bulge. It doesn't smell bad at all. There doesn't appear to be anyway to push it back in because the skin is strongly adhered to the protrusion. The protrusion is hardened and dried out---sort of like a umbilical cord that is about to fall off on a newborn baby.

 

[casportpony]

Hmmm... looks like it might be an infected puncture wound? Do you have a cat/dog vet? If so, give them a call and ask if they will look at her.

 

[Miss Lydia]

I agree with @casportpony K could it be proud flesh?

 

[farrah3]

Ugh. No luck with the vet's office.

Proud flesh is interesting---I never heard of it, but I guess that's a possibility (after some googling). I'm not sure if there is anything else I can do for her if that is the case.

Does anyone think I should try to pluck her feathers around the protrusion? If so, HOW? I have no idea how to do that.....with my fingers, tweezers?

Also---she is sitting on eggs (probably 5 days left to go). She tends to eat/drink less while sitting on them. Should I take them from her? Does anyone think this will encourage her to up her food/drink intake & swim more often? ---Or do you think it will stress her? When she's sitting quietly on a nest, she's calm, happy and relaxed.

The area in question appears to be closed up.....no smell, no maggots, no seeping, no bleeding. Just a dry umbilical cord-like protrusion.

 

[casportpony]

What surface is she nesting on? Another possibility is that it a "breast blister". They can get those from sitting for long periods on time on a hard surface.

 

[farrah3]

What surface is she nesting on? Another possibility is that it a "breast blister". They can get those from sitting for long periods on time on a hard surface.

She is in a shed with an OSB floor covered with a EPDM (synthetic rubber roofing membrane). She has a LOT of straw (approx. 12 inches deep when I put it down), but I have noticed her nest is much closer to the flooring material (maybe 1 inch of straw on the bottom) because she works very hard making a perfect round nest with nice tall sides. She must be moving the bottom of the nest to the sides to make it "taller". She has about 10 eggs in the nest.

 

[casportpony]

How would you feel about cutting into it?