GRAPHIC AUTOPSY PICS, any ideas????? New leg pics added

[Kassaundra]

Little history first. I have a 10ish week old cockrel that almost two weeks ago went lame in one leg, looked it all over and nothing seemed to be wrong, no breaks, bruises, injuries, bumble, nothing at all. He could move the leg, just couldn't walk well on it. I suspected an injury and allowed time for it to get better on it's own, which it did not do. So today I decided to cull w/ a view to eating, since I still suspected an injury. When I got to the inside portion of the process I found something unusual and wonder if anyone knows what was going on.

Here are the pics to show what I'm talking about


There are very large growths in the rear end of the abdominal cavity, these were all attatched firmly mostly to the back.



This growth at the front is the biggest, and just to the rt is the second biggest, it is partially buried behind and under the larger one so hard to see how big it really is


At the top of the pic see the pear shaped thing, maybe an extra teste?????? the object just to the lt and the one just under are both the testes, the one closest to the pear shaped object is normal shaped, the other one is not.




Here are most of them after removal w/ a quarter for size reference


These are the normal and the abnormal teste w/ the pear shaped whatever


The two largest ones, almost have a spiral shell type shape


And here they are cut in half




Until this boy went lame he was active and normal, after he went lame he continued to be active and normal, just had a very hard time walking.






Anyone see anything like this before, any ideas?????

 

[Majd]

Gosh...... no idea..... terrible.... maybe you can ask a vet.... for preventing your pulleets from such a thing... maybe giving proper meds??

 

[MumsyII]

Did you take pictures of the liver, spleen, heart, lungs, and bursa? If there are lesions on any of these organs, I would suspect Mareks. You need to turn the bursa inside out to get a good view of any irregularities.

I wouldn't eat a bird with this many tumors at such a young age. I imagine this was pretty alarming to find. It's hard when this happens. More questions than answers at this stage.

 

[Kassaundra]

I did not take pics of the other organs, but they were absolutely pristine and perfect. Good color, good texture and feel, no irregularities or abnormalities.

Not sure bursa????

 

[MumsyII]

I did not take pics of the other organs, but they were absolutely pristine and perfect. Good color, good texture and feel, no irregularities or abnormalities.

Not sure bursa????

The liver and the bursa are the biggest clues to tumor disease like Mareks using our eyes. If the liver was deep good red with no irregularities of small spots or discoloration, that is a great thing. The bursa is the sex organ right at the cloaca. It is round and ridged, and strongly attached. It needs careful removal and examination. When it is inverted, that gives many clues as to health. Many poultry diseases show up here first.
Edited to add: It is not uncommon for poultry to develop tumors like this. It is good you caught it early. Now you do what you can to spot any thing odd in any others. It could be a one time anomaly in your flock or something more sinister. Now you are on notice. This is not a bad thing. But a learning thing.

 

[Kassaundra]

I didn't know about the bursa and it is gone now so I can't check, but the liver was awesomely perfect.

I did see the bursa, just didn't know what it was, round like a marble just inside the cavity, right at the tail and attatched to the skin at the tail area. It was perfectly round and a nice color. I did not cut it open but the outside was smooth and perfect shape w/o any discoloration or growths

 

[MumsyII]

I didn't know about the bursa and it is gone now so I can't check, but the liver was awesomely perfect.

I did see the bursa, just didn't know what it was, round like a marble just inside the cavity, right at the tail and attatched to the skin at the tail area. It was perfectly round and a nice color. I did not cut it open but the outside was smooth and perfect shape w/o any discoloration or growths

Yep that's the bursa. When it is turned inside out, it is ridged. The inside lining of the bursa is what you want to look at very carefully next time. I think that clean healthy liver is awesome because a really sick bird is going to show it in the liver. Also the gastrointestinal track is going to tell you a lot if the bird was having all those kinds of symptoms. I have no clue why a healthy ten week old bird on the outside would be so filled with tumors on the inside. One tumor must have been growing and pressing against his spine or leg nerves. You did the right thing by ending his suffering. Hard but a necessary part of owning chickens.

 

[Kassaundra]

Have a new clue.

I generally throw the feet away, but being inspired by you feet boiling broth makers I had decided to try and peel the feet for broth and this is what I found after peeling the feet


This is the lame foot, see the big tear in the tendon


Here is the good leg



Look closely at the "good" leg the tendon is not right in it either, the spot that is torn in the bad leg is dark and mushy in the "good" leg

 

[MumsyII]

Have a new clue.

I generally throw the feet away, but being inspired by you feet boiling broth makers I had decided to try and peel the feet for broth and this is what I found after peeling the feet


This is the lame foot, see the big tear in the tendon


Here is the good leg



Look closely at the "good" leg the tendon is not right in it either, the spot that is torn in the bad leg is dark and mushy in the "good" leg

That looks like Necrosis and Myopathy. Wow. He was in trouble. The tumors may have been pressing enough on the nerves to cause the necrosis and myopathy in his legs! Much like what happened to my pullet!

 

[Eggcessive]

Thanks for posting these pictures Kassaundra, and Mumsy, for your interesting commentaries. Great posts!