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My first try at meat birds has turned into a disaster

post #1 of 10
9/8/12 at 12:15pm
Thread Starter 

I posted a thread in the "Diseases and Emergency" forum telling about how all my meat birds are sick.  I have 29 jumbo Cornish x that are 5 weeks and 20 Cornish rocks that are 8 weeks. They have a respiratory disease that has affected my whole meat flock.  My layers have been almost unaffected - I had one get it.   I have had to give antibiotic injections to three of my meat birds (when they got so bad they were gasping)  and have put bands on their legs, so we will be able to identify them when we butcher them.  We are starting the whole flock on oral antibiotics today.  Now I am wondering if it is even worth it.  Will the meat be good after all this?  Should we just scrap all these and call it quits?  We had planned on processing the 8 week old ones next weekend.  Now even if we even do decide to eat them, we will have to wait for the appropriate withdrawal time for the antibiotics.  I guess my question would be has anybody processed a whole flock that has been on antibiotics and have the meat turn out all right?

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post #2 of 10
9/8/12 at 2:20pm

I wouldn't give them antibiotics, especially the 8 week olds. I would just butcher those, they are the right age anyhow. Chances are their respiratory disease will not transfer to humans, but the antibiotics might. The meat will look fine, but it will have the antibiotics within the muscles. Are you sure they aren't gasping because they are over heated? Broilers tend to pant whenever the temperature gets above 80 or so?

It's pretty simple...having chickens is work, but lots of fun.

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It's pretty simple...having chickens is work, but lots of fun.

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post #3 of 10
9/8/12 at 2:39pm
Thread Starter 

No, the temps here have cooled off``we are in the TX panhandle. Today we are in the 70's.  They have clear fluid coming out of their nostrils.  It is not thick or discolored. A few of them are truly gasping and you can hear the fluid rattling when they breath. I think it is bad news.   My husband actually knows a poultry vet and took a video and sent it to him.  Hopefully, he can give us an idea if we really should cull all of them.  Only a few of them are of butchering size.  We grew them slow and they get a lot of exercise.  I will also know for sure after the lab results from the necropsy come back.  It is just very disheartening for this to happen when we tried to do everything right.  I just got in from orally dosing the really bad ones with Tylan and put oxytet in their drinking water.  I hope my Tylan 50 gets here on Monday.

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post #4 of 10
9/8/12 at 6:27pm

On the bright side, if you're using tylan to treat them it has a really short withdrawal period.  I think it's only one or two days for meat birds (although it doesn't list a withdrawal time for eggs and I'm sure if you can afford to let them go longer before slaughtering it would be better).

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post #5 of 10
9/9/12 at 2:10pm
Sounds like MG, and they likely picked it up from your lqyers. It is a chronic disease, which means it is not curable, goes into remission occasionally, so you can have birds that are carriers without showing symptoms.

I would cut my losses and just cull all of the birds showing symptoms, and hope the rest of the meaties pull through ok. Since it isn't curable antibiotics aren't going to help, anyway.

Next time, use netting and keep them separate from your layers. Or, replace your laying flock.

Course, you could just wait till they either die from it or are symptom free, but that is a rough road for them.

"There are too many books in the world to read in a single lifetime; you have to draw the line somewhere." --Diane Setterfield, The Thirteenth Tale

What I'm reading now:  Bullspotting: Finding Facts in the Age of Misinformation, by Loren Collins.

 

 

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"There are too many books in the world to read in a single lifetime; you have to draw the line somewhere." --Diane Setterfield, The Thirteenth Tale

What I'm reading now:  Bullspotting: Finding Facts in the Age of Misinformation, by Loren Collins.

 

 

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post #6 of 10
9/10/12 at 4:30pm

If you need to medicate, use Denagard by Novartis. It is off label for poultry in the US, but widely used against MG/MS in Europe. It is 8 cc per gallon of water as a preventative and 16 cc per gallon for three days for treating infected birds (discard and make new every 24 hours). Some birds won't drink the water with it in there, so you may have to add sugar, molasses, or something sweet (I had to treat my meat turkeys and put in a cup of sugar and 1/2 tsp almond extract with the meds).

 

QCSupply and I think ValleyVet carry it online. It is pricey, but lasts a LONG time. Also, according to the manufacturers website, their is no meat or egg withdraw after treatment. Their are several threads here on BYC that talk about it and you can just type Denagard in the search bar to find them.

 

Good luck.

Mom to 3 human children, 2 golden retrievers, 1 cat, 3 goats, 1 horse, 100+ chickens (Ameraucanas, BCM, Dark Cornish, BR, Orpingtons, Easter Eggers, RIR, & GNH), 19 ducks (runner, pekin, khaki, cayuga, silver appleyard, welsh harlequin), 14 Buff Saddleback Pomeranian & 2 Toulouse Geese, 13 turkeys, 3 guinea fowl, 4 guinea pigs, & a Senegal parrot.

 

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Mom to 3 human children, 2 golden retrievers, 1 cat, 3 goats, 1 horse, 100+ chickens (Ameraucanas, BCM, Dark Cornish, BR, Orpingtons, Easter Eggers, RIR, & GNH), 19 ducks (runner, pekin, khaki, cayuga, silver appleyard, welsh harlequin), 14 Buff Saddleback Pomeranian & 2 Toulouse Geese, 13 turkeys, 3 guinea fowl, 4 guinea pigs, & a Senegal parrot.

 

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post #7 of 10
9/10/12 at 5:24pm

the cornish x is the bird used in poultry houses . they are feed antibiotics and other preventive medication. not being able to see the birds i can not tell what is wrong with them.

you did not say what hatchery they came from. i do know that people in upper pa have a epidemic of corzya.. has your layer flock ever had what seems like a bad cold with sinus infection and diarrea.? if so the cornish picked it up from them. birds will always be carries of that and be able to pass it along to other birds.

 

in my opinion i would treat with the medication that has the fastest with draw.  if you want slow down the feeding to slow their growth down. i would unpasturized apple cider vinegar in their drinking water to help with nutritional up take and probotics.

. 

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post #8 of 10
9/10/12 at 5:26pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by bruceh View Post

the cornish x is the bird used in poultry houses . they are feed antibiotics and other preventive medication. not being able to see the birds i can not tell what is wrong with them.

you did not say what hatchery they came from. i do know that people in upper pa have a epidemic of corzya.. has your layer flock ever had what seems like a bad cold with sinus infection and diarrea.? if so the cornish picked it up from them. birds will always be carries of that and be able to pass it along to other birds.

 

in my opinion i would treat with the medication that has the fastest with draw.  if you want slow down the feeding to slow their growth down. i would unpasturized apple cider vinegar in their drinking water to help with nutritional up take and probotics.

. 

then i would slaughter to eat.

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post #9 of 10
9/10/12 at 6:55pm
Thread Starter 

The 8 week old chicks are from Mt. Pleasant--via a local person (which I'm thinking was a mistake) and the 5 weeks old are from McMurray.  I lost one of the McMurray chicks right after they got here and all the rest lived.   What I find interesting is I have 3 other birds that live with my broilers--the "mystery chick" from McMurray (a Jersey Giant), a Silkie rooster that I hatched in March and a Danver mix that I hatched in May- and none of these have any symptoms.  The broilers have had a marked improvement in just the 3 days on AB's. I do suspect that it is most likely MG.  Their nasal discharge was always thin, clear and non-smelly. My layers have never been sick until my NN hen (who is 2 years old) got sick (after these birds came in) and they consist of my original hens from 6 years ago to the new ones this year. Even none of my new hatches this year have shown any signs of illness. I maintain excellent records and clean the house almost every Saturday.  I know them all by name.   I check them every evening when locking them up and every morning when letting them loose.  We do not have a predation problem, so they are allowed to free range on 5 acres.  If it is MG, I will not cull my flock.  I feel that my hens have deserved the right to live out their natural life.  I just wont hatch any more chick for sale. We butchered our dual purpose cockerels and they had very little meat on them.  I wanted to raise what I eat, so we ordered these broilers (I know they are not really cornish x's).  I feed them fermented feed and put AVC in the water. My Tylan 50 got here today and will start it tomorrow and both flocks. But I still have to wait for about 2 weeks to slaughter from the withdrawal from the other AB and the 2 days for Tylan (for 3 days)

 

I am a little curious why Coryza is not treatable? (or is considered endemic).    It is a Haemophilus paragallinarum  which is just a bacteria.  Mycoplamsa I understand.  It is a little trickier, a bridge between bacteria and protozoans. Mycoplasma cultures also take much longer than regular bacteria, so if it is MG we wont know for at least 5 days-though PCR is faster and I requested both tests. I am also wonder why broilers are more susceptible?  Is it because of their short life span, so they have had the immune system bred out of them? 

 

I am wondering if I want to ever do broilers again, but I was so disappointed with my dual purpose birds that I think they are a waste of time and I am limited on space in my hen house to grow up the young roosters.

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post #10 of 10
9/11/12 at 10:09am

it is great to here you are using acv and fermented feeds. the birds are healthy and will have very little problem with them on flip or leg issues. i would treat and eat.if i even treated  i  finished a batch of cx's from mt healthy. they were fantastic. i let grow 13 weeks and got from 8 1/2 to 11.4 dressed ( no organs or neck). i lost 1 i think it drowned in a rain storm.

 

coryza is treatable. just the birds who are infected will always be carries.

i don't know why the people in upper pa are having issues. i helped a lady treat her birds. when i was talking to her she informed me of the huge issue up there. i am going to write her and ask her where she got the birds. 

 

i just finished freedom rangers. my first time with them. it is a ok bird. the pullets are nice birds. the cockerel very aggressive and rough.

 

i am now doing  a batch of cx's from mt-di poultry . i like them a lot. more active, alert and feathering out faster. at 2 weeks old. they are bigger than the last batch fro mt healthy. when i spoke to george , the owner of mt-di he informed me they are a little slower growing bird. time will give me the answer. i started a thread called  meat birds tell us how you did it. check it out if you want.

 

just saw they were from mt pleasant. as you now know buying birds from people sometimes can be a big mistake, unless you know them or get personal references.


Edited by bruceh - 9/11/12 at 10:17am
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