Moving Forward- Breeding for Resistance to Marek's Disease

[chooks4life]

Ah, gosh, surely time for some success stories.

Here's hoping things start to improve for everyone.

Best wishes.

 

[ochochicas]

Ah, gosh, surely time for some success stories.

Here's hoping things start to improve for everyone.

Best wishes.

My first batch of double vaccinated chicks is 17 weeks old now. The cockerel died, but the pullets all seem to be doing OK. The two production girls (both sex links) are getting big combs and I would expect them to lay the first couple weeks of August. That is good news I guess! All my unvaccinated chicks would have shown signs of illness by now. I'm hoping not to lose more!

 

[HeritageGoose13]

So this is a huge thread and I am just looking through it. Could anyone give me a brief overview of the best ideas/techniques here for breeding resistance?

Also I see some have mentioned commercial layer feed being poor quality. What does everyone else feed instead? Do you buy some kind of expensive feed? Do you totally free-range? Mix your own feed? How do you know what you feed is better than layer pellets?

 

[lalaland]

I can't help with best ideas to breed for resistance (don't think we know them yet, nor agree on the possible approaches), but I'll say this about commercial feed - meaning the factory produced pellets and crumbles - it is mostly made from waste products (chicken meal, for example). I"m not saying flocks won't survive on those feeds. I do think thriving is another issue.

I am lucky in that I don't live in a city so have access to local mills that make their own - with additives, yes . When I lived in the city years ago, keeping a small backyard flock, I would drive a couple hours each way to get feed.

When I took in some hens from someone who needed to rehome them a few years back, the hens came with a mostly unused bag of pelleted feed, can't remember which but it was a national brand. I put some out so the new hens could have access to their familiar food til they settled in. They ignored it and went for the feed I gave to the regular flock.

I experimented - withheld the regular feed and the new hens would eat a little, mine refused. I finally dumped it in the woods.

fast forward a few years later - unexpected plans had me catching a flight instead of picking up a load of feed. I had a friend pick up a bag of feed from fleet farm (crumbles, I think it was) to tide the flock over til I could get back. THe flock picked at it but didn't eat much. After a few days, the person caring for the flock while I was gone brought over a bag of feed from her flock ( a local milled feed) because she was worried about how little they were eating, and my flock ate it up.

Highly processed food isn't good for us, and isn't good for the chickens either!

 

[seminolewind]

I've tried a lot of brands and right now Feather Fixer has them the healthiest and most productive. It's 18% protein. 16% may be okay but after any other snacks they get, their diet isn't really 16% anymore. If chickens free range they are not getting anywhere near 16%. On 18% they have been laying all year, when the year prior was almost nothing. Like 2 eggs a day to 10-12 eggs a day.

The other thing that I think is most important is the date on the feed bag. You may have to hunt for it, but it's there. Some place tried to dump a year old bag of feed on me once. Most stores have bags that are weeks to a few months old depending how high their turnover is. With a higher protein %, you can give them things, leftovers, meat, veggies, etc. to make up for what may not be in the feed.

You can also supplement poultry vitamins and electrolytes in the summer . I think the heat is more stressful than anything else. Lala, I don't know much about breeding resistance, but I do know that chickens always like the cheaper feed and while you give them fresh water, they are drinking the puddle in the dirt!

 

[lalaland]

that is so true about the chickens preferring to drink from muddy, yucky, gross puddles on the ground!!! It definitely made me relax on cleaning the waterers - don't get me wrong, I try to keep them clean, but that means probably every other day on most of them. I know I read on byc from people who are, on a daily basis, bleaching them out. I haven't ever used bleach and most of the time am just scrubbing clean with sand, rinsing well and refilling.

I don't ever empty the waterers out in the run though, because the chickens will run and drink despite the amount of chicken droppings.

 

[ochochicas]

My chickens are fans of clean water for some reason. The don't drink the water in the run if there is any bedding or feathers in it. They will wait until I let them out and then run over to the horse buckets and drink from there. It is also funny watching them drink the "drips" from the underside of the gate or from the hose reel. Sometimes I'll make a little river running down the hill just to watch them all go after the water. LOL

 

[alibabba]

Are your chicks being raised in the coop or with the flock where the Marek's birds lived? If they are, then vaccinating them probably won't make a difference. If they are housed in a different area and you don't think your hen is a carrier, then you can vaccinate and then keep the chicks isolated from "contaminated" areas for 3 - 6 weeks.

My double-vaccinated broody raised chicks are now orphans. Their mom left them at only 5 weeks and they were not scheduled to be integrated into the flock for at least one more week. Poor little babies are still in the chicken tractor by themselves. They love to free range in the afternoon, but with no one protecting them I worry constantly that a cat or raven will get them. Tonight they were so cute at bed time. They flew up on the table and wanted to roost with me...I'm their new momma!

Sorry haven't replied in so long. Had a Cocci outbreak in 32 + chicks I had picked up. Dang it, that was rough. In and out of the house, multiple courses of Corid and antibiotics. Too wet here in my yard...might be a good thing for Marek's...I think read it survives better in dry conditions.

That you were their Momma is adorable! Chickens are crazy and would eat us up if they had the chance, but they are so dang cute.

To answer your question. I kept then in separate pens on very unused part of the yard for many weeks. They are out and about now. I am at my limit of what I can manage as far as building pens.

Just wait and see.... for now. Would be so great if the parents were not vaccinated and did have immunity that was passed along. Not counting on it.

 

[alibabba]

I'm having the same issue as Seminole. One of my double vaccinated/quarantined cockerels is sick. Not typical Marek's signs, but I'm still suspicious. He's had diarrhea for 2 weeks and is losing weight. I started him on Tylan and Wazine and noticed his crop is not emptying. Doesn't seem impacted, but I'm treating him as such. Tubing with water and crop massage 3x daily. He eats and drinks and walks around a tiny bit, but mostly just sleeps all the time. I think he might be too far gone already, but I had another pullet that survived the crop thing (just to die from Marek's later

). I'm still going to try though. Don't we all want to have a success story?!?!!?

Cocci? I had a huge outbreak in chicks. Some blood, most not, just hunched diarrhea and sleeping. Moving to nibble or a tiny drink.

Also had a couple with not sour, not impacted crop. Just sort of squishy. Sounds similar. I gave olive oil water first and a few crop massages and fed some Exact and rice, bread, and instant grits oil to try to move a possible block and the carb foods not feed the Cocci protein (along with Corrid water) Working. One did have a bit of blood tinged poo and was back out in 48 hrs.

 

[alibabba]

that is so true about the chickens preferring to drink from muddy, yucky, gross puddles on the ground!!! It definitely made me relax on cleaning the waterers - don't get me wrong, I try to keep them clean, but that means probably every other day on most of them. I know I read on byc from people who are, on a daily basis, bleaching them out. I haven't ever used bleach and most of the time am just scrubbing clean with sand, rinsing well and refilling.

I don't ever empty the waterers out in the run though, because the chickens will run and drink despite the amount of chicken droppings.

They really go out of their way to find something gross to drink. Oh when the water overflows into the muck they run to it, like a treat. blech.