Backyard Poultry Forum

This thread is for poo pictures only, so that we can build up a library of them; both healthy/normal and ones related to illness.
It is NOT for your chooks problems! If you know your chook was suffering from a specific illness when they did the poo, please include that information.

So everyone, out with the camera and crawl around in the chook pen and take some pictures!

I repeat again - no long stories or questions! Just Poos.
If you have a question, please start a new thread!


I'll start with some 'normal' poos.

This one is an ever so slightly out of focus normal poo


This is another normal one with a small pink thing in the centre - a piece of shedded intestine lining.


This one is the result of eating lots of green stuff - very dark and gooey, but also normal.


And this is a caecal poo - normal once a day or so.


A clearer 'Normal' poo pic!


NellyG

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NellyG ........................

Poopology

This topic may be a little disgusting to some of you, if you have a weak stomach or find the tedious examinations of your birds droppings nauseating I suggest you turn back now. For the rest of you, let's go check out the poo.

Everyone knows a bird is sick when you see it sitting still, looking depressed with the feathers all disheveled. The problem is, that description alone is only a tiny fraction of the puzzle to diagnosing what is wrong with your bird. As you already know, treating the symptoms never works; you must find the cause and treat that if you have any chance of saving your birds life.

Often finding the cause can be as simple as taking a closer look at your birds' fresh droppings.

Practice observing your birds droppings first.
Hopefully your bird is quite healthy right now and this is the perfect time to practice poop observation. Use a plain print newspaper, white paper or wax paper on the floor of your birds cage so you can see the droppings clearly.

Once you have an idea what healthy droppings look like you'll have little trouble spotting the signs of illness later.

If you normally use pine shavings, corn cob, pellets or any of those other fancy floor coverings you will find it very difficult to keep an eye on the droppings.

Once a month or so you should switch to paper so you can note any unusual changes in the droppings.

What is all that stuff in the droppings?
Bird poop is actually quite remarkable in it's own right because all forms of waste are expelled at once in one tidy little blob.

There are 3 parts to that blob and you much learn to tell them apart of this article is to be of any use to you.

Urates are the crystalline section of the urine. This part will appear chalky white and has a consistency that isn't really watery or solid. As close as I can describe the constancy would be good old Elmer's' glue, just not as adhesive.

Urine is the clear part and is like water. In fact it's not much different than anyone other animals pee. Sometimes the Urine and Urates will mix and form a cloudy liquid, don't be alarmed if you can't always tell the two areas apart.

The Feces is the third part and it's the only real solid part. It'll be that tubular shaped section in the middle of the dropping. It may be straight, coiled, of even broken up in to smaller yet still tube shaped pieces.

Normally inconsistent or consistently abnormal?The one thing to remember with droppings is they will normally be inconsistent when healthy. This is due to the fact that a healthy bird will be eating a rich and varied diet. When ill the droppings will be consistently abnormal.

Color and consistency can indicate health problems.
Always remember that diet, stress and environment will have a natural effect on your birds' droppings.

In times of stress the droppings will naturally be more watery. This is due mostly to the birds fight or flight instinctual response. When in a panic birds will expel any waste in their system prior to taking flight. More Urine and Urates are produced than feces each day.

If the stress is ongoing the majority of the droppings will have very little feces in them, if any at all.

You'll also notice a lot more urine in the droppings if your bird is drinking excessively or eating foods high in water. Lettuce and fruits are very high in water and are the most common cause for watery droppings.

Even birds that enjoy bathing frequently may have watery droppings because as they are preening off the bath water they will ingest some of it.

The color of feces may change from time to time depending what your bird has eaten recently. Seeds and green veggies will naturally produce green feces while blueberries and blackberries produce black feces.

If you feed your bird a pellet diet the feces will often be the same color as the pellet if they are colored or a rusty color if they are not colored. If you think your birds feces looks wrong keep the diet simple (back to seeds) for a day and re-check.

Thankfully the bird digestive system works very fast and you'll have any odd food induced colors worked out of the body fairly quickly.

Urates (the chalky white part)
Green: Liver Disease or Anorexia
Yellow: Liver Disease or Anorexia
Brown: Lead Poisoning
Red: Internal Bleeding (low in the digestive track) or Kidney Disease
Increased Urates: Dehydration and possible kidney problems

Urine (the clear watery part)
Green: Liver Disease
Yellow: Liver Disease
Red: Internal bleeding (low in the digestive track), Lead Poisoning, Kidney Disease
Increased Urine: Drinking a lot, Eating foods high in water or Disease (often bacterial)

Feces (the solid tubular part)
Black or Tar-like: Internal bleeding (high in the digestive track)
Pea Green: Liver Damage
White or Clay color: Pancreas or digestive problems

Lumpy or Undigested food: Incomplete digestion, foods too hard to digest (corn or maize), Stunting syndrome.

Always remember to keep an eye out for worm segments in your birds' droppings.

Diarrhea:
When a bird has Diarrhea the feces will be soft and will not be the typical tubular shape.

Polyuria:
Abnormally large amounts of urine being generated by the bird
Polyuria is harder to spot in some birds. Often the first sign that this illness is in your flock is when your bird drops dead suddenly. This illness is often fatal and has the most profound effect on young chicks. The few chicks that do survive to adulthood often develop poor feathering and beak malformations. The only way to know if Polyuria is in your flock is with Veterinarians assistance. Polyuria may be caused by viral infection, stress, and kidney disease or poisoning.

Should the droppings smell?
Healthy birds' droppings have no noticeable odor if they are fresh. A fowl smell is often a sign of infection in the digestive track. Most commonly it'll be a bacterial or yeast infection.
Black cecal droppings occur daily in all breeds of chickens, so don’t go into panic mode if you smell or see them

Oh, what to do...
Once you have a fairly good idea what is ailing your bird, you need to begin treatment. In some cases this is as simple as adjusting your birds diet. In other cases treatment with any hope of a cure isn't possible. In extreme cases of kidney, liver failure or internal bleeding your bird may never recover.

When in doubt always consult your local avian veterinarian.
When dehydrated encourage your bird to drink. If that doesn't work use foods like Lettuce, fruit or even cooked rice to get extra water in to your bird. Do not pry open your birds beak and attempt to force water down its' throat, this will almost always lead to aspiration and death.

The only time you can attempt this is with a crop tube and even then I do not recommend you put pure water in to the crop. Rather mix up a thin mixture of hand feeding formula so the bird is less likely to regurgitate and aspirate.

If the droppings aren't quite right but you can't pinpoint the problem either, you may want to try a few simple remedies.

First step…. Give multi vitamins
Second step…. Give Electrolytes
Third step… Keep a close eye on the droppings, if you notice any change then act quickly to find out who and separate the sick bird until you know what is causing the problem

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Sandy

very good topic,

i love taking photos of poo. i shall work on getting a different one to what you have.

can you give more info on caecal poo? there seem to be more when the weather is wet or there is a change in diet.

maybe if i win a photo comp i will think of a topic something like this. will get everyone out observing poo. my birds have lots of grass in theirs. broody hen poo won't be as good without the smell

k

Ok - me next. These poops are from a group of 12 week old birds with a case of cocci (here is the link to the thread if you want to know more viewto ... ?t=7956286) :
This is the first one that alerted me to something wrong, note the bright blood:


These pics are a bit later on, after treatment has started:

Might be an idea to add the word "poultry" to the thread title

that better cackles?

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NellyG ........................

Why... this could end up even more interesting

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Sandy

This is a dropping I thought was unhealthy, but turns out it's perfectly ok. My chooks were sneezing at the time and had come off a course of antibiotics a week previously.



It's a little caramelly and liquid but this is probably diet-related, mostly likely large amounts of green leafy veg and maybe yoghurt. The long darker tube bits are healthy.

Also something to note - chook droppings can be considerably larger than you may expect. I've got ones that wouldn't look out of place under a horse

This one would be about the size of the inner part of one's palm. I'll try to supply other items for comparison with additional photos coming up.

Ok, my fellow poopologists


Check this one out... you will LOVE it!


*link broken*

You can imagine my thoughts when i found that one... *expletives!*

I must admit to being a little amazed by it...
a - the fact the chook was still standing (and pretending to be quite well)
b - the appearance of what I took to be worms (and consequently went away after treating her for worms)... I thought them too short and fat... did wonder if what I was looking at wasn't perhaps a portion of her intestine


PS. the chook is fine and enjoying her poops appearance in 'pooplogy'... the worms were executed - i did not feel the need to notify them of their fame - imagine the royalties

PPS. Bit of an after note... the above mentioned chook is no longer with us... though she lived for a considerably long time after pooing the pictured poop...

I have since come across a few dropping pictures that look like this ... and on each one the outcome was that what looked like worms... was actually puss formed into long wormy looking things in the droppings... each picture they looked exactly the same ... same color.. same size and shape..

So keep an eye on this bird Sammi... this may be an underlying problem that was masked by worming her..

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Sandy

Cecum - Cecal Droppings:

Definition:

The cecum marks the beginning of the large intestine and is basically a big pouch that receives waste material from the small intestine.

The cecum or caecum (from the Latin caecus meaning blind) is a pouch connected to the ascending colon of the large intestine and the ileum.

It is separated from the ileum by the ileocecal valve (ICV) or Bauhin's valve, and is considered to be the beginning of the large intestine.

It is also separated from the colon by the cecocolic junction.


Variation amongst species
The cecum is present in mammals, and two ceca are present in most birds, and some reptiles.

Most herbivores have a relatively large cecum, hosting a large number of bacteria, which aid in the enzymatic breakdown of plant materials such as cellulose.

Exclusive carnivores, whose diets contain little or no plant material, have a reduced cecum, often partially or wholly replaced by the vermiform appendix.

Anatomy of the Cecum
The term cecum comes from the Latin, meaning blind gut or cul de sac.
In dissections by the Greek philosophers, the connection between the ileum of the small intestines and the cecum was not fully understood.

Most of the studies of the digestive tract were done on animals and the results were compared to human structures.

The junction between the small intestines and the colon, called the ileocecal valve, is so small in some animals that it was not considered to be a connection between the small and large intestines.

During a dissection, the colon could be traced from the rectum, to the sigmoid colon, through the descending, transverse, and ascending sections.

The colon seemed to dead-end into the cecum, or cul-de-sac.
However, the connection between the end of the small intestines, ileum, and the start of the colon, cecum are now clearly understood, but the name has not changed


In humans - The cecum is about six centimeters (cm) long and 7.5 cm wide. The ileum (of the small intestine) dumps waste material into the cecum and the cecum passes it on to the colon, specifically the ascending colon. It doesn't do so through a little tube; the cecum is continuous with the colon.

If you look at a picture of the cecum and see a little squiggly thing hanging from it, you're looking at the appendix.

To learn more about colorectal anatomy, please take a look at the
http://coloncancer.about.com/od/thebasi ... /index.htm
gallery.

Source:
1. Cecum. Merriam-Webster Online. 11 Sep. 2006 [http://m-w.com/dictionary/cecum].
2. Cecum. Wikipedia. 9 Sep. 2006. 11 Sep. 2006 [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caecum].
3. The Large Intestine. Gray's Anatomy. 11 Sep. 2006 [http://www.bartleby.com/107/249.html].
Also Known As: intestinum caecum
Alternate Spellings: caecum

Cecal Droppings from a Bird:

All birds deposit Cecal droppings several times a day, it is usually very smelly, sometimes very dark in color or yellowish/brown

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Sandy

Example of bloody droppings from Clairetje:



This particular example has been discussed further in the following thread:
Blood in Droppings
Any questions or comments can be posted there.
Thank you

Example of possible cancerous/tumour passed in droppings:



This particular example has been discussed further in the following thread:
second sick chooky
Any questions or comments can be posted there.
Thank you

This was passed by a healthy pullet after eating red cabbage:

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Currently owned by Victoria (Heinz 57) and Annie (Barred Rock). RIP Gytha, Esme, and Maggie.

This was passed by a sick chook who was refusing to eat. As you can see, there is no solid matter in it:



Although not showing clear signs of coccidiosis, this chook responded to sulpha medication.