Evening star., 1914-12-20
Crop Bound Fowls.

Mrs. B. ]. Hamm. writing from Ber-
wyn, Nd, to the poultry editor of The
Sunday Star calls attention to the con-
dition known as Crop bound' in poul-
try and remarks that she performed
the operation of opening and cleansing
the impacted crop Of a valuable hen
and sewing the wound up, as long as
seventeen years ago. Results, she says.
were excellent, and since then she has
performed the same operation a num-
ber of times. Mrs. Hamm writes:
II am interested in poultry and en-
joy reading the articles on the subject
that appear in The Sunday Star. We
now have flock of Rhode Island Reds,
but formerly kept barred Plymouth
Rocks.
"One morning We discovered that a
setting hen had a very full crop-in
that the food in the crop was doing
the hen no good. 1 told my husband
that the hen, valuable one, would
starve to death if her crop remained
full. I had never heard of cutting into
the crop to empty it, but l decided to
do just that, knowing that by perform
ing the operation we could not do more
harm than would be done if we left the
crop as 1t was. So my husband held
the hen. head and feet, while /, with a
sharp knife. made an incision about an
inch long in the loose skin of the hens
breast and into the crop. Then with
ted grass, which was packed into the
crop SO tightly as to cause all the trou-
BILE. Then 1 took a needle and white
linen thread and sewed first the crop
breast. washed the wound with clean,
warm water and covered it with a lit
tie vaseline. The hen, when released
began to pick at the wet feathers on
hnF tnvan nSJt 80 nynlr 60
the ground. She recovered with no
trouble, but a month later 1 had to
perform the same operation on her.
Still later she became crop-bound for
the third time, so decided to cut off
her head.
Il gave this hen no special food after
effects; in fact. the day after each
as eyer. That was seventeen years ago.
In the last few years I have read Of
this operation being performed. the
articles making it appear as if the
"A year ago 1 had two chicks about
three or four weeks old that became
crop bound. I knew they were too
young to withstand the operation. so
food. l gave tn m milk, but they SEEM
ed to have SO little life that when TAX
ing a drink of the milk they would
stand beside beside the drinking e, vessel and
but as I did not want to lose them 1
gave them warm milk. also warm olive
oil. I also massaged their crops in the
effort to loosen the hard-packed
masses of food. 1 kept the chicks in the
house for awhile, but later placed them
in a small pen in the yard. I gave
them no feed. but plenty of water. The
sunshine seemed to put life into them
They began to scratch, and l know
those chicks worked hard for the little
grain they found in the pen. But the
exercise, together with the treatment
I gave them. soon released the food
from the crops, after which they were
given their regular feed. and had no
further trouble with them"
notwithstanding the fact that Mrs
Hamm was successful in operating on
crop-bound hens the operation of OPEN
ing and cleansing the crops of fowls more
frequently kills than cures the fowl
Unless the fowls are deprived of feed
for forty-eight hours after the opera
tion septic conditions usually arise,
the wound gangrenes, and the fowl
dies a lingering death unless its suf-
ferings are ended with the ak.
When fowl is seen to be crop-hound
administer large doses of castor Oil.
warmed. Hold the fowls beak open and
pour the oil down its throat, giving at
least a teaspoonful. and repeat the dose
three or four times during the day. A
mixture CT equal parts Of GIVE Gil aud