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Author Topic: Impacted crop in flooded Somerset  (Read 2381 times)

Possum

  • Joined Feb 2012
  • Somerset
Impacted crop in flooded Somerset
« on: February 12, 2014, 04:34:18 pm »
I have 5 year old Rhode Rock with an impacted crop. I noticed it 36 hours ago. Gave her some olive oil yesterday and tried some crop massage. It is no better today and she is occasionally having trouble swallowing. She still pottering around and eats from time to time.


It's the first time I have had to deal with this and, since she is not getting better, I would like to take her to the vet. But....... we are marooned by the floods at the moment and I can't get to the vet. Does anyone know how long a hen can last with an impacted crop that is not getting better?

chrismahon

  • Joined Dec 2011
  • Gascony, France
Re: Impacted crop in flooded Somerset
« Reply #1 on: February 13, 2014, 06:47:06 am »
Its all down to gradual weight loss Possum. If it is just an impacted crop she will be able to drink and that's what she needs. If the apparent impaction doesn't shift it may be a blockage further down -an impacted gizzard. In that case all you can do is keep her moving about and hope it clears as there is no other cure.

Possum

  • Joined Feb 2012
  • Somerset
Re: Impacted crop in flooded Somerset
« Reply #2 on: February 13, 2014, 12:13:31 pm »
Thanks Chris. She is still moving around and drinking, so hopefully it will gradually get better. I had heard that a vet could operate and remove the blockage, so longer as it wasn't something nasty like a tumour. Do you have any experience of this?

chrismahon

  • Joined Dec 2011
  • Gascony, France
Re: Impacted crop in flooded Somerset
« Reply #3 on: February 13, 2014, 01:00:31 pm »
Someone on the poultrykeeperforum had their hen operated on by the vet to clear an impacted crop, but it was a result of a grass impacted gizzard so the hen died. I can't imagine a vet could get to a gizzard and open and clear it. It was a massive job just doing a post-mortem on one of our hens with grass impaction. I would say if the crop doesn't clear in a week of massaging it will probably be a gizzard impaction. It took our two hens two weeks of slowly plodding around and pooing almost nothing to suddenly go downhill and die. The material in the crop and intestines had rotted and I suppose it was the toxins that killed them. They had plenty of weight to them. Their crops were not really hard though, they felt about right but full and loads of massaging would shift it through. When I opened one up I couldn't believe the amount of grass that was in the gizzard -was three times normal size.


The thing I learned was not to put birds from an earth run onto grass without a crop full of feed and not to put birds onto long grass at all.

Possum

  • Joined Feb 2012
  • Somerset
Re: Impacted crop in flooded Somerset
« Reply #4 on: February 13, 2014, 08:01:03 pm »
Oh dear. That might explain it. I had to move them from their normal run because it was waterlogged. The dry bit of land that they are now on does have long grass. I also found this particular hen pecking away at potato peelings on the compost heap, and she had also eaten the polystyrene that was insulating it. (She has always been the greediest of all the hens)


I will just have to carry on with the olive oil and massage. :fc:

 

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