How to ID a Chicken’s Cecal Droppings

The cecum is a blind pouch that branches off the juncture of the small and large intestine. Humans have only one, but chickens have two. A chicken’s cecal droppings differ from regular intestinal droppings.

The word cecum comes from the Latin word caecus, meaning blind or hidden. It’s pronounced SEE-come. The plural of cecum is ceca.

The ceca gather in fluids, materials dissolved in the fluids, and extremely fine digestive particles. Their purpose is to maintain a reservoir of the proper microflora for fermenting digestive contents. The ceca also digest fiber, absorb moisture, and produce all eight B vitamins.

Cecal Worms

The ceca harbor cecal worms (Heterakis gallinae), the most common parasitic worm in North American chickens. They are thin, white, about 1⁄2 inch long, and easy to see with the naked eye.

Cecal worms have a direct life cycle. A chicken gets them by eating eggs of cecal worms expelled by itself or other chickens. Cecal worm eggs can survive for long periods under a wide range of environmental conditions.

Cecal worms rarely affect a chicken’s health, but they do carry blackhead. However, most chickens are resistant to blackhead.

Also called histomoniasis, blackhead is a serious disease in turkeys. That’s why keeping turkeys together with chickens is generally not recommended. But, like many other backyard poultry keepers, I’ve never had a problem keeping them in the same yard.

Identifying Cecal Droppings

The ceca empty their contents two or three times a day, or approximately every tenth dropping. A cecal dropping is readily distinguishable from the more frequent intestinal droppings. It is looser and smellier and lacks the white cap. Depending on the chicken’s diet, cecal droppings might be mustard yellow, chocolate brown, or greenish brown.

The ability to identify cecal droppings is important for monitoring the bird’s health. The typical texture, color, odor, and frequency of a chicken’s cecal droppings indicate normal digestive function.