Avian Leukosis Virus (ALV) clean Legbar source

[HaikuHeritageFarm]

Interesting... but the mycoplasma did not come from Cackle surely. How many did you purchase? Did they all start laying on time (<30 weeks?). and sorry to hear that you are dealing with this in your flock.

Oh no, definitely not. As far as I can tell it was introduced by two outside legbar hens that exhibited no symptoms despite a lengthy quarantine. They laid very well and were my only breed to continue laying well through the winter and I believe all started before 25 weeks. The eggs are not exceptionally large, but they are a good size and IMO a good blue.

I did get a mix of true cream and more yellow birds, and have some lovely white sports from them, too.

I will also note in my review of Cackle legbars—I started with a large flock of 25 to cull from and had no losses even from my adult flock during the mycoplasma incident after a full year. We only faced problems with the young birds we had hatched that were exposed, which is normal.

 

[LikeTurkeys]

Oh no, definitely not. As far as I can tell it was introduced by two outside legbar hens that exhibited no symptoms despite a lengthy quarantine. They laid very well and were my only breed to continue laying well through the winter and I believe all started before 25 weeks. The eggs are not exceptionally large, but they are a good size and IMO a good blue.

I did get a mix of true cream and more yellow birds, and have some lovely white sports from them, too.

I will also note in my review of Cackle legbars—I started with a large flock of 25 to cull from and had no losses even from my adult flock during the mycoplasma incident after a full year. We only faced problems with the young birds we had hatched that were exposed, which is normal.

That is excellent news! I think I will be ordering from them! Their reviews are pretty good with regards to health too. Thanks for your feedback.

 

[Iluveggers]

I hope more people respond w their CL experiences! Now I am nervous about adding any…

 

[The Bougie Coop]

I know this is an old thread, but I found it today because I just lost my CCL, Wrenni, last week. She was 7 months old, had just started laying about a month ago, and because her death was so sudden and unexpected, I had her necropsied. Turns out she had a raging case of Avian Leukosis Virus. Reading this thread really makes me sad. I got her from a local, very reputable feed store, but I know they tend to get their chicks from Mt Healthy and Meyers, but I don’t know exactly where she came from. I also had gotten two Opal Legbars from the same feed store when I got Wrenni, so now I am worried they also have the virus but have not shown it yet, especially since they were brooded together. I am planning on testing my entire flock and I may have to make some hard choices if others test positive.

I really love my Legbars and this really makes my heart hurt.

 

[LikeTurkeys]

I know this is an old thread, but I found it today because I just lost my CCL, Wrenni, last week. She was 7 months old, had just started laying about a month ago, and because her death was so sudden and unexpected, I had her necropsied. Turns out she had a raging case of Avian Leukosis Virus. Reading this thread really makes me sad. I got her from a local, very reputable feed store, but I know they tend to get their chicks from Mt Healthy and Meyers, but I don’t know exactly where she came from. I also had gotten two Opal Legbars from the same feed store when I got Wrenni, so now I am worried they also have the virus but have not shown it yet, especially since they were brooded together. I am planning on testing my entire flock and I may have to make some hard choices if others test positive.

I really love my Legbars and this really makes my heart hurt.

I'm sorry to hear this. If you do want to test, stay away from RAL! They're one of the few companies that claim to offer ALV testing and I believe they're a scam. They offer tests for practically every chicken disease (and many other animals too) all for the same price of $20 per test. Very unrealistic, especially considering that the only other places that would do it (reputable) is the University of Georgia for $300 per test. I spent at least $400 with RAL to get 11/12 birds testing positive which is extremely unlikely considering only about 1/10 birds become carriers. The test results were also poorly formatted, I can send them to you if you want more info.

Anyway, enough on that! As an update to this thread, I got 25 Cackle Hatchery birds in 2022 and all did great. None showed signs of ALV so I'm assuming they didn't have it. I was able to breed them with healthy offspring afterward and I'm very pleased with the results. However I also acquired 3 cockerels from GFF this year from their 2023 line and one of them died at around 20 weeks or so. I didn't necropsy him, but I think I know the answer anyway. He was getting progressivley thinner and just didn't look healthy. So it would appear even GFF's new line is infected.

 

[SourRoses]

I hadn't heard much about this virus before so I looked up the details in the Merck Veterinary manual.
It was confusing to see they said (on different areas) both that it's present in most commercial flocks, and that it's been removed from most commercial flocks.

How prevalent is it actually?