Yesterday we noticed Peppers breast looked a bit enlarged and lopsided. I was pretty sure that was her crop and remembered reading about impacted crop from other peoples blogs. I looked it up on the internet and sure enough I think I am right. The advice is to give live yogurt and live maggots. It also advised not to give bread which made me realise she has had too many noodles. I thought I was being careful as I had read a teaspoon per hen, morning and evening is okay but what I hadn’t taken into account is that pepper was getting the lions share, as she is always first and fastest when it comes to food. She may have been getting two teaspoons to the other two getting half a teaspoon each. The other two girls look fine and Pepper is eating, drinking and seems happy in herself. I am kicking myself at slipping up so early on.
I think Pepper has got impacted crop, this is her bulging right side
This morning I tried to tempt them with some live yogurt (there will be no more noodles for a long time). I tried some on it’s own and some mixed with chick crumb and even topped this with a few meal worms to try to get their interest but they were having none of it. I decided to leave the little pot with chick crumb and yogurt with them and go buy some maggots. I looked on the internet and found a fishing tackle shop that sold them.
I returned at lunch time, checked in on them and to my surprise the pot of yogurt and chick crumb was empty. After lunch we decided to try a small pot of the maggots. The advice is to give them, as their afternoon treat each day and it should fix the problem within about five days. At first they couldn’t get the hang of it but suddenly they got it and loved them. It’s the first time one of them would pick one up and run off so it couldn’t be taken from her. Once they realised there were enough to go round they steadily worked their way through them then all had a snooze.
Pepper has a maggot in her beak
I feel really bad that I hadn’t realised Pepper was getting too many noodles and am really cross with myself, but the good thing is that I was able to recognize the problem straight away because of all the information I have read from the blogs I follow, this information is invaluable.
After the maggots Pepper and Dotty settled together for a snooze. Dotty was constantly preening Pepper.They are so tight together whereas Poppy will wander on her own a bit. I wonder if Dotty is at the bottom of the pecking order, preening pepper who is at the top and Poppy in the middle does her thing some of the time.
Dotty is preening Pepper while Poppy does her own thing
Click here to see the history of my flock.
She might have just had a really full crop. One sure fire way is to check them first thing in the morning, at sun up. Their crops should be empty. In the afternoons they can be really full and lopsided looking from all they’ve eaten all day.
Here’s hoping she was just really full and not impacted.
It’s sun up before 5.00am here at the moment (the coop door opens automatically) and I go out to them between 6.30am and 7.00am. She still looks lop sided so I think it must be impacted unfortunately. The good news is they took the yogurt straight away this morning. I will give them yogurt in the morning and maggots in the afternoon and really hope this will work. is there anything else you think I should be doing? When does this become a problem for a vet?
Well, it can become a problem really quickly. But if she’s eating and drinking and pooping and her tail is up, then I’d give it a bit more time.
Is she tame enough to hold? An impacted crop will feel hard instead of soft and squishy like a normal crop.
She is eating , drinking, pooping and her tail is up. She is eating the yogurt and the maggots, especially loves the maggots. The advice I read said this takes five days to work which would take us to Sunday.
Unfortunately she won’t let us pick her up and we blocked off the nest box to stop them getting into the habit of sleeping there, which would have been the best place to try to pick her up.
I think I will continue with the maggots until the weekend and if it’s no better consider finding a vet on Monday. I so hope she gets better soon.
really cool website. i loved it.http://www.plactual.com
Thank you, I am so pleased.
Hi, I have been ready your post about Pepper, I believe my Speckled – Margery may have a compacted crop I have noticed that she appears lop sided and tonight when I picked her up I can safely say the crop felt quite solid I didnt want to squeeze too hard for fear of hurting her. Can you let me know if the Live yogurt and maggots worked as if so I will purchase some asap.
Many thanks
Rachel
Hi, When I felt Peppers crop it was soft, so not impacted after all. If you read on you will see that I now wonder if she has a tumour as it has remained lop sided and getting bigger.
How ever if your chook has a firm crop it may well be impacted. The yogurt and the maggots are supposed to work after five days and can’t do any harm, so I would try that. They really love the maggots, it seems a bit gross at first but nothing else I have given them has excited them as much as the maggots, and they can eat them every day and they won’t do them any harm. I would try it, do let me know how you get on.