Chicken acid reflux??

[RoosterHuggerLiz]

I've got an elderly silky/polish rooster who was a rescue after being dumped due to his older age. He's extremely quiet and sweet and loves people but he has a problem with keeping food down, I've never seen him throw up but watching him eat or even randomly he'll make a sound as if food or fluid is coming up through his throat and him do a chewing motion to push it back down, I've had him for about a year now myself and as far as we can tell he's about 5 or 6 years old. It doesn't seem to bother him too much and he eats and drinks plenty. I've already tested for an impacted crop and that doesn't seem to be the case now, for the first couple of days he was having a hard time with digestion probably due to him eating random garbage on the side of the road before I got him, I massaged his crop and gave him lot's of water and soft foods for about a week until the mass had finally cleared and he past all of the impacted food. Do you guys have any clue what's going on with him?

 

[Wyorp Rock]

I would re-check to make sure his crop is emptying overnight.
Get a fecal float to see if worms may be part of the problem.
Lastly, look inside his beak for canker or yellow/white pasty material.

This issue is not necessarily new to him right, he's done this since you got him (or maybe I'm reading it wrong). If the actions are not new, then at some point prior he may have suffered some type of injury that makes it more difficult to swallow.

If he's eating/drinking and the crop is emptying, I'm not sure what else you can do but continue to see that he's drinking well and offer wet/soft feed.

 

[RoosterHuggerLiz]

I would re-check to make sure his crop is emptying overnight.
Get a fecal float to see if worms may be part of the problem.
Lastly, look inside his beak for canker or yellow/white pasty material.

This issue is not necessarily new to him right, he's done this since you got him (or maybe I'm reading it wrong). If the actions are not new, then at some point prior he may have suffered some type of injury that makes it more difficult to swallow.

If he's eating/drinking and the crop is emptying, I'm not sure what else you can do but continue to see that he's drinking well and offer wet/soft feed.

I'm sure they don't have worms or parasites because I bring them to the vet regularly, I checked for the pasty material you spoke of but I can't seem to find any, yes this has been happening since I got him! His crop empties completely at night and he eats and drinks plenty.. maybe he's just getting weaker with old age?

 

[RoosterHuggerLiz]

I'm definitely going to talk to my vet about this in May when I take my birds for a checkup