One of my ducks laid a large egg this morning, and I just found her with her "parts" hanging out. Not bloody, but swollen and rather sore looking. I rinsed and tried to push them back in, but that didn't work. Now I have her in a rabbit cage so that she can't drag "it" (what do you call the egg laying parts?? oviduct?) through the dirt, but I'm still worried. Seems I read a story once of a farm vet who coated the uterus of a prolapsed cow with sugar, which somehow caused the swelling to stop, and fixed the problem. Or was it salt?? Seems like salt would hurt. Any advice will be appreciated.

-- Shannon (Grateful Acres Animal Sanctuary) (gratacres@aol.com), July 20, 2000

Answers

Shannon:

If you were to get it back in and it stayed, chances are excellent it's coming back out with the next egg. In cows they sew the opening almost closed, but that isn't practical in this case. I know this isn't the purpose of your Sanctuary, but I'd recommend calling around to see who would like a nice duck dinner next Sunday. You can't save them all.

-- Ken Scharabok (scharabo@aol.com), July 20, 2000.

Shannon:

I doubt this is going to work, but it might be worth a try. I've check every livestock reference I have and can only come up with this. Wash the exposed part with clean, slightly soapy water, then straight water. Push it back in, which may require something like the cleaned end of a broomstick coated with vasoline. Once in fill as fully as possible with ice cubes to try to bring down any swelling. Put on a bandage to try to keep everything in. When she appears to be trying to lay another egg, assist her all you can. Some vasoline won't hurt. Repacking and icing may be required a couple of times. I am not a vet, nor have any particular experience in this area, and this must be rare in ducks as I cannot find any mention of it. Mostly a guess on my part so take it for what it is worth.

-- Ken Scharabok (scharabo@aol.com), July 20, 2000.

Shannon, this is a tough one. I'm pretty much going to agree with Ken. I've never had a large bird do this, so I'm guessing. I wouldn't put salt on, it would indeed be painful plus the salt would be excessively drying. I have heard of using sugar, just never on birds. Don't really know what would happen. The standard treatment for prolapse is greasing and returning if possible. Use vaseline, barely warmed olive oil, glycerine, something simple and unscented, not a hand lotion.

I'm not at all sure how you'd bandage a duck butt, but if you manage, do find a way to post a photo, please. What worries me about a bandage is that while it would be important to help keep her from re-prolapsing, she's gotta go too. You'd end up with a nasty mess held up against her rear. If you feel like throwing money at the duck, find a vet who does work on cage birds, it is possible to sew the prolapse in. It just takes an experienced vet with micro-surgery equipment and skill. But the idea of getting something cool (be careful about cold, this is an extra vulnerable area), is certainly a good one. The only thing I've been able to come up with yet is something like a hog pan or dish pan filled with cool water for her to float in. But it would take some serious time on your part because you'd need to give her a clean pan every time she relieved herself. She's in terrible danger of infection and antibiotics and waterfowl don't mix. I don't even know what antibiotics could be used on a duck in her condition.

For cage birds, the recomendation is to put them in a hospital cage and give them a heat lamp or other warming source. The idea is to relieve the bird's body of part of its work in maintaining body temp so it can put more resources into fighting the injury and infection. You need to keep her well feed for the same reason. You might consider buying her a bag of WATERFOWL grower, or even starter to mix in with her feed to help get some easily digested energy into her. Calcium and oily seeds are part of the prevention diet if the bird survives, so it might not hurt to get some oyster shell and ground sunflowers for her.

She may recover pretty much on her own, or she may either die or have to be put out of her suffering. There's no way to tell. I wish you both the best. Gerbil

-- Gerbil (ima_gerbil@hotmail.com), July 20, 2000.

Thanks Gerbil, thanks Ken. I'll post whenever/however the situation is resolved.

-- Shannon (Grateful Acres Animal Sanctuary) (gratacres@aol.com), July 20, 2000.

Preparation-H

-- JerryR(La.) (jwr98@hotmail.com), July 21, 2000.

The duck would have been dinner in my case, of course, but I'm still interested in knowing what's possible for future reference. How did it make out?

-- Don Armstrong (darmst@yahoo.com.aud), July 25, 2000.

We had a duck that this happened to. From what we read, in Dave Hollderead's book, The home duck flock, there is no cure for a prolapsed oviduct, and it is necessary to put her out of her misery as soon as you can, so that is what we did. I do think that in her case it was caused by our having too many drakes, which were overbreeding the ducks. We started eating the drakes and haven't seen any more prolapses since. The story about the cow was with sugar, but cows don't give birth every day, so they would have a chance to heal up, plus stitches are used to keep the uterus in there, whereas the duck has to lay an egg almost every day.

-- Rebekah (daniel1@transport.com), July 26, 2000.

A possibility, if caught in time is to clean the prolapse with warm soapy water with a small amount of iodine solution. Dry the affected area by gently patting with a soft cloth. Once dry, spread a little Preparation H on the area, (no kidding) it will help with the swelling. Cage rest the duck alone until she improves. If you want to add some sort of bedding, be sure not to use anything that might stick to the prolapse. A duck that started laying at too young of age, is overweight, or just laid an unusually large egg can prolapse. Sometimes diet or infection can contribute to a prolapse. I know this answer has come a little late but I hope it might help someone. I would like to know what happened to the duck.

-- Tresa Smith (dirge1@msn.com), November 28, 2001.