Blocked vent

C

chickenfan

Active member
Joined
Mar 9, 2013
Messages
1,049
Reaction score
0
I have a cockerel who has an impacted crop and, I have also discovered, an incredibly hard and swollen vent. I presume the impacted crop is a sign of the whole system being blocked. I have sat him in warm water for ages and massaged the vent for ages, as well as syringing water into it. He has managed to do a small loose dropping but is in a very bad way. Does anyone know what this is and how to treat it?
 
Two possibilities spring to mind chickenfan. First is impacted gizzard though this normally results in no or very watery droppings, don't know if the bird has had access to long grass recently? it is unfortunately almost always terminal. Second is poor contraction of the intestinal muscles so that the poo and food just isn't moving properly, normally this is due to damage to the instetines due to disease and/or worms, never had this but again I would imagine the prognosis isn't good. Have go at massaging the crop and feeding olive oil, also an idea to see if he will take some yoghurt just to get some calories into him, if the crop manages to clear then you will know that is was a crop problem rather than something lower down.
 
I wonder if it is some sort of tumor in the vent. I think this is the source of everything being blocked. I haven't managed to soften the vent mass at all. He's not been on any long grass and was wormed not long ago - unless he could be blocked by dead worms - but this doesn't account for the vent mass. He is very poorly now and is such a nice-natured bird, and the favourite of my hens. I will take him to be shot this evening unless anyone has any brilliant ideas.
 
He has now done quite a lot of watery diarrhea and his crop is a lot smaller - but poor bird is fading. His vent is very strange, like a long white solid sausage sticking out. Perhaps it is impacted gizzard as you suggest. Or perhaps he is full of tumors.
 
Re the sausage like vent, it's not a prolapse from him straining to move the faeces is it?.
 
Hi Dinosaw. Its not inside out. I did have a bird with a prolapse once and I don't remember it being like this. Its a very firm thing. My poor boy is collapsed now and I feel so so bad that I didn't discover this earlier. He had been crowing less for a few days and I should have picked up there was something wrong.
 
I don't want to make a mistake like this again. I wonder if it could have been a prolapse with no redness and being so firm. Perhaps it was. I didn't even look at his vent yesterday as I thought I was dealing with impacted crop. He had so much life in him until recently and such a character.
 
Sorry he's passed chickenfan, it's not always easy to spot illness especially when you have quite few birds so don't beat yourself up about it. My recommendation is that if you can face it you do an autopsy on him, see if the gizzard is compacted, see if there is anything blocking the intestines or whether their are lesions or tumours present. It may seem hard to face but if you can find what killed him then next time you will be armed with that knowledge to help you.
 
Thanks Dinosaw. A friend has offered to do an autopsy I think it perhaps was a prolapse as it seems these can be very hard in a cockerel. Perhaps he didn't always have enough grit. It just shows how careful you have to be to examine all over at the first sign of a change in behaviour.
 
It seemed too complicated to get to my friend 20 miles away and I was worried about decay, so I've had a look myself. He had a very full gizzard containing lots of grit and some undigested corn, but the vent was the most peculiar - a large, dark-grey, firm mass 2" x 1". This couldn't be a normal vent could it? I think he had a growth. It had some horrible gas behind it. There wasn't anything much in the crop, nor anything much in the intestines beyond the gizzard - which also didn't look quite normal. It was easy to cut into with no strong walls. But I am really amateur at this and have only prepared two birds for meat so can't fully remember the anatomy. My cockerel looks very peaceful in death and it wasn't too bad cutting him open.
 
Impacted gizzard is normally a large solid mass of mainly (but not always) grass or other fibrous material, not normally much grit in there so that can probably be discounted. It sounds like he was trying to clear himself out. I must admit I've never had cause to study the vent when I have done autopsies on chickens but that doesn't sound normal. Here is a link to how to carry out chicken autopsies which is useful as it has a photo of a pullets vent in one of the photos, not the same I know but it gives you something for comparison

<broken link removed>
 
What an incredibly helpful autopsy link Dinosaw. This is a really useful thing to have so thank you very much for taking the trouble to pass it on. Not much I could have done about my bird with that very abnormal big lump by his vent.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Latest posts

Back
Top