Impacted-Crop in Chickens

 

Chickens are one of those animals who seem to just die for no reason at all sometimes. Sometimes there is a noticeable pre-existing factor that contributes to their death, but a majority of incidences related to bird mortality happen for no good reason at all. 

While I have been fortunate enough to not have many birds die, there have been a few (like 15 over a 5 year period). About 80% of the birds that have died over the years have been (a) old, and (b) died with no pre-existing problems. The other 20% that have died all died from impacted-crop (a condition that will occur when a chickens' crop cannot pass food into the stomach to be digested). Impacted-crop can happen if a bird eats something that's too big, or even too much of something small. Almost every instance that I've dealt with is because of the chicken eating a lot of long grass, then mixing it with a lot of feed, which creates a nasty paste inside of the crop. However, impacted crop kind of depends on the chicken, as two chickens may eat the exact same things, but one will get impacted crop and the other won't. The common symptoms of impacted-crop are: lowered head tucked into body, dull comb and wattles (the red "things" on their head), and a crop that feels like a water balloon. 

For free-range chickens, there isn't really anything you can do to prevent impacted-crop, especially if they are allowed to roam over a large area. But, the good news is that impacted-crop isn't super common! The bad news is that there isn't really a good way to take care of the chicken once it has an impacted-crop. Sometimes you'll get lucky and the crop will clear after a day or two, but that doesn't happen often. The only other way that I've had (minimal) success is to force the chicken to throw up. 

In order to make a chicken throw up, I have to turn the bird downward with their head to the ground. I usually keep the chicken locked in between my knees so they can't flap their wings. Using one hand, I'll stretch their neck out all the way, then gently massage the crop towards the throat. After a few seconds, the chicken will start to throw up some of the stuff in their crop. If caught early enough, you can get the crop mostly cleared out, but if the crops' really full, the chances of fully emptying it aren't great. 

I've heard that surgery can be done on the crop to fully empty it. Don't get me wrong, chickens are a lot tougher than they look, but performing surgery on an animal that is practically last in line on the food chain doesn't usually make sense. Furthermore, the crop is essential for eating (softening feed) and drinking, so having stitches in the crop wouldn't work (leaky crop), which would mean that the chicken would need a feeding tube (how to successfully feed and water a chicken through a tube, I don't know:) At that point, the chicken may be even closer to death's doorstep from the surgery!

Basically, if the forced throw-up doesn't work, or the chicken doesn't get the crop to un-impact by herself, the only other option is to kill the bird to put it out of its misery. Thankfully impacted-crop isn't too common, but when it does arise, it most often results in one less chicken on the planet....unfortunately.