Apple Cider Vinegar

[Perris]

Scientific Studies? Sorry but the Scientific study posted is no more scientific
(or objective) than that famous 'scientific' study that claimed that famous ocean liner, the Titanic was unsinkable. In fact this scientific study is little more than a personal testimonial like the Titanic's claim to Invulnerable.

Furthermore, in none of these studies were the beginning blood sugar or fat levels comparable to each other. Also any scientific study conducted once with only 7 test subjects is fatally flawed from the get go. I am constantly telling people that you paid good money for your chickens and that you should do with them as you see best. The same applies to your body and to a large extent what you are allowed to put into your body, including apple cider. However this tolerance ends when false claims are made and honest but trusting people put their faith, not to mention their health and hard earned money into these made up claims.

As for lumping Political ideologies in with false or misleading claims made about apple cider vinegar or any thing else for that matter, this is a lame attempt to drag a red herring across the path to either hide the truth or else rally like minded individuals into the fray. When someone touts something that is not proven fact and that non-information takes on a life of its own despite facts or non-proof, or has the potential to cause harm, then in my book that is criminal.

so can you cite a scientific study that supports your views? So far you've offered only your opinion.

 

[Aerliss]

Those very short term studies of broiler chicks weren't relevant, IMO. Really not relevant to long term life of free ranging 'normal' chickens at all.
Mary

You're unlikely to ever find a long term study on free ranging chickens. No one is likely to fund that because even free range, organic farms don't keep chickens around past their first season. There's no need for them to know what the effects might be two, three, five years down the line. It would be a very difficult study to carry out as well, due to the free ranging creating a whole host of variables.

Someone MIGHT fund a self reporting long term study asking many BYC owners to fill in surveys over a long time period**. It would require a LOT of people filling out surveys, and one serious piece of analysis software to cut through the numbers and reduce the variables to background noise.

Best we can do is extrapolate from short term studies on chickens, and long term studies on humans. Chickens are used quite often as models for humans in both biological and behavioural experiments, so using humans as models for chickens shouldn't be too strenuous a leap;

https://www.upc-online.org/experimentation/experimentalHistory.htm
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18428358
http://www.understandinganimalresearch.org.uk/animals/10-facts/chicken/

**Hey, we COULD do that here! We could create a survey, and ask people to fill it in periodically, over a long term. It would take some organising, and would need to be robust. People would HAVE to stick with it. Then number crunching would be hard (I find stat analysis painful), but it is something we could carry out here, theoretically.

 

[HollyWoozle]

How about ACV as a treatment for sour crop? I read that the acidity can help to kill off the yeast.

 

[Aerliss]

How about ACV as a treatment for sour crop? I read that the acidity can help to kill off the yeast.

There are lots of studies out there about the antifungal and antimicrobial affects of acetic acid, what we call vinegar, and the bacteria that produce acetic acid. Most of them are in relation to preventing alcohol from turning to vinegar, improving fermentation times, and preventing food spoilage.

Basically, there are two mechanisms; the acidity, and the competing bacteria. At the right level the acidity kills the "bad bacteria" and yeasts. As for competing; yeasts feed on sugar and produce alcohol. Acetic acid producing bacteria feed on sugar AND alcohol. So they have an extra food source and can out compete the yeast. They then produce more acid to kill what ever yeast is left.

However, at low levels of acidity some "bad bacteria" can actually grow more rapidly... though its only the odd one, and is unlikely to be the ones you're fighting with sour crop.

This is an old but a good study and write up. Just Google that title. I can't link to pdf on phone;
INHIBITING EFFECT OF ACETIC ACID UPON MICRO-
ORGANISMS IN THE PRESENCE OF SODIUM
CHLORIDE AND SUCROSE
A. S. LEVINE AND C. R. FELLERS
Massachusetts Agricultural Experiment Station, Amherst, Mass.
Received for publication January 27, 1940

 

[Aerliss]

I should add that sour crop is a symptom. The root cause of the digestive system not moving needs to be addressed to cure it. Killing the yeast will help relieve symptoms, but not cure the problem.

 

[HollyWoozle]

That's so helpful, thank you. We had a hen die recently who had sour crop but she had various other problems and I guess the sour crop was just a symptom as you suggest. I tried my best to treat her but she was an old hen, evidently with some underlying health issues. I just thought it would be helpful to know more about it so as to be prepared for the future.

 

[Trish1974]

To each their own. There will always be yay and naysayers about EVERYTHING.

Everyone seems so hung up on "scientific studies" these days but those too can be botched and faulty. I recently spent a weekend in continuing education seminars and it came to light the big "scientific study" that got statin drugs approved turned out to be faulty. Sometimes the people who fund or perform these studies have an interest in the outcome which can swing results one way or another. Especially with the advent of the internet - anyone can write and publish anything these days. I trust hands on experience more than any study I could read.

I personally am a garlic/oregano/ACV user (on myself and my flock). I've not had a sick bird yet. Luck? The supplements? Who knows, but I'm just going to keep doing what I'm doing. I have learned through the years not to waste the time and energy in swinging someone's opinion about something they are adamant about. Diversity is what makes the world go 'round. Lets all just do our own thing! PEACE!

 

[Aerliss]

There's a hierarchy of scientific studies.

Single study, small number of test subjects, short time scale.
Single study, more subjects, longer time scale.
Multiple, replicable studies with large numbers of subjects over a long time scale.

And then you have bouncing around in there the studies that are not done in controlled environments, but of large enough, with a good analysis then they can be exceptional data sources.

Look for studies in solid peer reviewed journals, or at least write ups in respected pop sci magazines like New Scientist. I don't know how it works in America, but in the EU scientists usually disclose their revenue sources, or its easy enough to find out... mostly its the EU itself.

The bigger the study, the more likely it is to be robust and not funded by dodgy money. The main danger is seeing a single study that says something favourable and assuming it's right without checking their methods and analysis for yourself. I've read a lot of small studies where I've questioned the methodology, or the analysis, and then looked for any replication of the experiments (experiments must be replicable to be of any worth) and found either nothing, or studies that found something different. The media makes this mistake all of them time and scientists hate it. They make a strange discovery, report it in a journal, the daily mail or fox news runs with it and chaos ensues. When that study is really just the beginning and those scientists have years of replicating and expanding their experiments ahead of them.

 

[Aerliss]

That's so helpful, thank you. We had a hen die recently who had sour crop but she had various other problems and I guess the sour crop was just a symptom as you suggest. I tried my best to treat her but she was an old hen, evidently with some underlying health issues. I just thought it would be helpful to know more about it so as to be prepared for the future.

I'm sorry to hear you lost your girl that way. It's so difficult when they get sick because there's just so little veterinary assistance available. We have to work with what we can dig up ourselves a lof ot the time. Still, you tried, and if she was an older girl at least she had some good time with you in this life.

 

[HollyWoozle]

I'm sorry to hear you lost your girl that way. It's so difficult when they get sick because there's just so little veterinary assistance available. We have to work with what we can dig up ourselves a lof ot the time. Still, you tried, and if she was an older girl at least she had some good time with you in this life.

Thank you! Sweet Dotty was given to us by some friends a few years ago (along with her 2 pals). She seemed a lot better on her last day and was walking around, eating and drinking but was dead in the coop in the morning. I really did my best for her but hope at least to have learned from it so as to better care for the others.