Big Bad Mareks

[2ndTink]

When I was growing up my Dad always told me this.

"In life there will be set backs. Sometimes you will have to take a step backward so you can move forward again. Do what you have to do so you can move forward again. Keep your eye on the prize."

Thank you. That is very true.

I'm hoping the Mareks impact on the chicks will be minimal, I know silkies are susceptible and this chick's mother and father were from the same breeder and with the amount or surprise colors and such popping up, maybe they are too closely related and maybe not as vigorous as if I had crossed birds from different lines. Next spring, who ever is left (hopefully everyone) I'll be able to cross silkies from 4 different breeders.

Lately I've been considering what my goal should be, originally it was SOP silkies, but, I've been thinking of the value in the genetics of my unvaccinated Mareks survivors even though they aren't the SOP birds I was planning to breed for. If I have many more issues with Mareks in my vaccinated silkie chicks, that will be all I need to shift my focus from SOP to breeding tougher little fluffs. If 80% if backyard flocks have some form of Mareks, then some more resilient silkies for the average backyard chicken lover will definitely have their place. It seems locally that people want funky looking chickens, wild colors, leakage is good, red combs don't matter... I can set up some breeding pens to collect and sanitize hatching eggs from that will deliver frizzle, satin, satin frizzle, silkie, and colors from light to black, chocolates, mauves, apparently I've got wheaten hiding in there and partridge as well.

 

[2ndTink]

I’m sorry to hear. I hope you can get them through this without any more loss. Hugs from me and my flock, Tink.

Thank you, I'm hoping this is the only one with my heart and my brain is throwing scary statistics at me...

 

[2ndTink]

Past due for an update, so here goes.

I hatched and vaccinated A LOT of chicks this year. Of my vaccinated chicks I had some classic Mareks paralysis losses and some that just wasted away over a few weeks and passed or needed to be culled. The second to last one that lost weight quickly and passed, I had a necropsy done. It returned as lymphoma likely caused by Mareks. I've lost one more since then with the same symptoms. I kept track of all the hatches and have notes on what's happened with each chicken.

I've had 13 losses I attribute to Mareks this year in my vaccinated chicks. Over my whole flock size this was 10% to 15%, but I just dug into the data and found that 100% of the losses all came from one hatch! I had a refrigerator that was freezing and thawing (it was from 1994 and was finally giving up) and I believe it destroyed my vaccine wafer. My hatches before that and after that have had zero losses that I can easily attribute to Mareks. I had ordered new vaccine and kept it in a small fridge with a thermometer tracking the temp after that second hatch.

This gives me some hope that the vaccine is effective against the Mareks strain I have, and as long as I only use vaccines that I know were properly stored then I should have a much better year next year.

Along with the vaccine, I've also started using Chinese Skullcap in their feed and switched from Corid to Toltrazuril for cocci. We had a bad cocci year and Corid wasn't cutting it, but thankfully a local breeder who was also going through a hard time with cocci recommended changing to Toltrazuril and it's been great.

My plan going forward is to be really careful with the vaccine storage and if I have any doubts, throw it out and get a new bottle. The cost of the vaccine is nothing compared to the heartbreak of watching my chickens go through Mareks.