(Chicken got a cold?) Added Info.(MS/MG,ILT,CRD,NPIP)

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Thank-You for posting all of these threads.
Very informative.
My chickens have had sneezing, a snick or hack occasionally and 2 or 3 have had a clear sinus drainage at times.
No eye symptoms at all. No swelling anywhere.

I have not given antibiotics. I have given them grated garlic mixed in with cooked, cooled grits or oatmeal in the am only.
I have also started to add half a capsule of olive leaf just in the last day or 2.
It is supposed to be an anti-viral and knocks a cold out of DH in a day or 2.

Vitamins in one waterer and ACV in the other although I wonder if the ACV won't cause them to lose a little weight as it claims to do with people.
I may go back to plain water in that one.

Of my 8 chickens, 2 have never gotten any symptoms, 3 have gotten them and recovered, and the last 3 still have them. I think those 3 were the last to get "it".
Whatever IT is.
 
There is some very interesting info here but if all birds are infected why would only some produce symptoms? also, would it even be safe to eat infected birds and there eggs? It seems it would be unsafe to eat eggs and birds that are infected with crd or any other illness.
 
Wow, I'm amazed, thank you all so much for reading up on this !

I had one hen sneeze, cough and carry on. She began to get secondary complications like not running around, hoarse and coughing. I did treat just her with Terrymicin, I'd dunk bread in the antibiotic/water and feed the rest plain dry bread.
That was Frieda and still, 4 years later, she is the only one out of 5 layers that have shown signs.
The others may keep their immune systems up by chance, body chemistry, who knows. Like you can catch a cold, yet me sitting next to you will not.
I have had a bantam with severe symptoms, brought her in, treated her in quarentine, yet once she went in with others of her type, they never got sick. Kathleen, origionally treated with Terrymicin, relapsed 1 year later, then again, after going broody, succumed to pneumonia, and sent her to State to be tested to find she was resistant to the Terrymicin. So, being like everyone, I used an antibiotic for a virus and when I really needed it to work, it was to late.
None of the other birds that were in close quarters has ever shown signs.
This bacteria has no boundries like a bacteria should, it hides in the system dormant until stress and wanders around like a virus. (as I shake my head)
There is no easy answers, yet I know that NPIP does not cover MG,MS, ILT etc. But if you bring a grain bag in, shoes from the store, fair etc you will bring it home. If you take your show stock to a fair/show, its almost guarenteed that your bird now is highly contagious.
Now, the next snicker is a local man never allowed his show flock to self breed. It was all done by artificial insemination. (yes, I even giggle) And this protects them from the contagious bacterias, but also makes the hens and chicks immune to certain other diseases that are passed transovarian or in seminal fluid.
For every one thing you learn, the further behind you get on knowledge.
If you have any suggestions to another winter project, please let me know. I have a long lonely winter and need something to keep me occupied.
Again, thank you so much for keeping this going, it is my passion to share knowledge and to learn.
Kel
 
Quote:
Eggs and meat bacteria is killed when subjected to heat. The only health issues you need to use care from is Pullorm & Typhoid and this is what the NPIP testing is all about. (National Poultry Improvement Program designed in the 1930s to protect us from the complications and death that P&T cause).
 
I'll try to explain this to you as easily as I can, there are different strains of it, and some of the strains are more viralent than others, which is why some birds react and others don't, it's because they already have that particular strain that they don't react. And it is good to be rid of the disease or to control it, it is a deteriorating disease and that even though you don't see symptoms is continuing to increase itself within the birds. I know this is hard to understand.

You are right about eating the meat and the eggs because they are cooked at a high enough temperature to kill the mycoplasmas, however don't make an egg nog without knowing the birds are clean. I work at a restaurant and for years have been waiting on health care people, after about 7 years of waiting on this one particular nurse I asked him why he always ordered his eggs over hard, or well done, it was because of the mycoplasmas was what he told me.

Mycoplasmas are passed to the eggs and there is a rate at which they can be passed was what I was told from infected flocks to the eggs. This is a disease that passes to the eggs and then you hatch out carriers then you have the case of only the strong survive and then they are carriers, you may see no symptoms for years, stress will cause carriers that have this to break over into the symptoms, then they become contagious and spread the disease, and it goes to the rest of the flock within 5 to about 15 days. Mites will also perpetuate its spread. This is not something the birds build up an immunity to like you'd think, there is no real immunity that is built up they contract whatever strain they have been exposed to, and then pass that on to their eggs. So the cycle continues.

In order to get rid of it, you have to break the cycle. It is also important to know that innaculating birds for other diseases the innaculations won't work if the mycoplasmas are present, for instance do a search on Infectious Bronchitis and Innaculations to use with birds that also have Mycoplasmas, the mycoplasmas have to be under control first. And innaculating for mycoplasmas is another issue, some have tried that, one woman did the eye dropper innaculations and it thru her birds into the symptoms, and that is something that is not a one time deal, you have to do it repeatedly, I can't remember if its every 3 months with each individual bird now, at the time I was researching it I knew. According to major Poultry Science people accross the country Mycoplasmas are present in 75 to 90 percent of Backyard Flocks, most people don't have a clue their birds have it, and you are right the hatcherys don't test for it.

There are a couple of places in this country that you can get clean birds from clean tested flocks including clean of mycoplasmas, I do know that. Most people don't test their bird for other diseases, the ones that do test usually only do the NPIP testing, there are additional tests that can be done but they are not free, and you have to ask for them to be done.

Mycoplasmas also affect fertility as well as egg production and the birds ability to fight off other disease challenges, imagine you have birds that are carriers for Mycoplasma, they become exposed to another disease, the disease causes the birds to become stressed, stress causes them to also break over into the Mycoplasmas they are carriers for, then your poor birds are trying to fight off two diseases at the same time, not very good odds of survival at all.

In order to try and get rid of it, you have to break the cycle. And blood tests will tell you what your birds have, if you can draw the blood yourself for doing the testing there are some Labs that will test the blood, not all Labs will let you do that, it has to be in certain blood tubes for the tests. And overnight shipping.

I have birds that were from clean tested flocks including clean of mycoplasmas and I can tell you there is a difference in how clean birds act, the rate at which they lay eggs and their whole overall appearance. Finding them took me almost 2 years, and after what I went thru to get them I treat with a product monthly as part of my Mycoplasma control program with my birds. I have Araucanas and Marans, I just lost my only Wheaten Marans Rooster in late May, he was a year old when I lost him to Wet Fowl Pox, right before he died I drew blood on him and sent it to the Diagnostic Lab for testing, I also sent dropping samples to have tested for parasites, the vet wondered about Trachea worms, his droppings were clean, no parasites, no coccidiosis, no Salomonella, no ILT, no IB, no Mycoplasmas, no AI, and no to the rest of the diseases tested for, there was no blood test for testing for the Fowl Pox, I found that out about 90 dollars later, I hated loosing my Rooster, I did find out thru his testing what I pretty much already knew about my birds, I did bring my birds in at night, they were also outside during the daytime and they weren't kept inside of buildings 24/7. I do handle my birds differently than some people do or I should say manage, I remember that storm that was previously talked about, that storm blew stuff from all over the south to the north, before that storm hit I put all of my birds inside and I also put them on what I use as a preventative for Mycoplasmas and I do think putting them inside helped to keep them from being exposed.
That is something I do every time there is a storm of that caliber.

I can tell you how to try and get rid of it, and depending upon the strain of Mycoplasmas the birds have will also contribute to getting rid of it. Some of the more viralent strains what I use won't work alone. Some people know me for helping with their birds when their birds were gasping for air and laying on their backs and dying. There are some people that used what I do once for the birds when they were in an epedemic state, there are others who continue to use it to try and breed the Mycoplasmas out of their flocks and keep it from being passed to the eggs they hatch. It is possible to get a clean flock from a dirty flock, some hatched out new flocks and culled the original flock and dissinfected and maintained the new flock. It is possible and has been done.

If you want more information contact me privately, my e-mail address is listed in my profile.
 
Thank you very much for that information! Greatly appreciated! Feel free to post what other info you have here, its where folks can share this type of information.
 
According to major Poultry Science people accross the country Mycoplasmas are present in 75 to 90 percent of Backyard Flocks, most people don't have a clue their birds have it

I do not believe this for one second. They absolutely cannot know this unless they have tested 75-90% of all backyard flocks in the U.S. and they have no clue how many there are or where they are. That seems a convenient excuse for hatcheries to nix any attempt to be MG free, which does cost more to achieve, and this is the reason that the big hatcheries use for not claiming by any stretch to be mycoplasma-free. I cringe when I hear people say this. It's like, oh well, everybody has it, so I don't need to worry about biosecurity at all. Why try?
hmm.png
Mine may not be MG-free forever, but it won't be because I was lax and brought in started birds or let just anyone roam around here without at least disinfecting their shoes, etc.

I would be highly upset if I got a chick from any of these hatcheries and brought it into my MG-free flock and then BOOM! my flock is no longer safe. For this reason, I refuse to purchase anymore hatchery stock. It's bad enough that most of them have already died from internal laying, but at least that is not contagious.​
 
Hi Cynthia,

I hated hearing the statistics too for what they say is in our flocks, I don't know if that is based off of the lists of birds that have been tested that there is a record of or not.

I do know there is something regarding the eggs or the lack thereof, go to www.thepoultrysite.com when the page comes up lay your mouse on technical information in the menu, then follow it accross to poultry diseases and click on that, from the list locate egg drop syndrome and read thru that information, I think it is contagious, it also mentions some of the other diseases in the diagnosis part of the information there, and you will CRD is one of those listed, so it is involved.

You may see no symptoms from your birds and they may appear healthy to look at them visually, the only way to know for sure they don't have diseases is to test them for diseases, and costs for testing are thru the roof which is why alot of people don't test.

I had birds at one point that I had to depopulate because of the mycoplasmas, I had Cochins for a couple of years and had nice healthy birds always laying never sick, no signs of respritory disease whatsoever. I decided I wanted to purchase Marans and found 3 birds I could get from someone about 5 hours away from me, I went and looked at the bird, inspected the guys place, it was well organized and very clean, no over crowding, separate buildings for his Incubator, brooder, and grow out pens, really nice operation and the guy I still talk to and help today, very nice man, I brought the birds home and immediately brought them inside, I put the Rooster in a pet taxi in my living room for the evening and the 2 pullets I put in a large box in my spare bedroom, I told my husband when I got home from work the next day I would take care of them and asked him to feed and water them for me, when I came home from work, as soon as I got in the door, my husband said "Did you know this Rooster is sick" I was shocked, he took him out of the pet taxi, he had sinuses running, rattly breathing, I then went to look at the pullets, one was 3 months old and no symptoms from that one, the other was 4 months old and was sneezing, I immediately called the breeder to let him know and he was shocked that they were sick, they didn't ride to my house from his in the back of a truck the birds were in the backseat of my car all the way home, so being exposed to bad elements wasn't the reason why for what was happening with them, I got antibiotics and put in the water to treat them with, I also called all over the place trying to find out what to do, I had to go get everything to treat them, I had never had a sick bird before, after about 5 to 15 days the rest of my birds outside started coming down with the same symptoms as these Marans, also the 3 month old pullet that appeared quite healthy died without any symptoms the first week, after months of trying to treat them and the rest of my birds getting sick and some dying, I decided I wanted to get the correct medication to get rid of whatever this was, and wanted blood tests done to know what I was dealing with, I called here in Ohio the State Vet, he wanted 75 dollars a bird just to see them, and the testing costs was ontop of that amount, I found thru searching a Lab out of state that is the same as the Ohio Lab credentials, that would test for me if I drew the blood and sent it to them, the vet was great to work with, I had a problem drawing blood, everytime I stuck the bird it flinched and I flinched, after several trys and me feeling bad for poking my poor bird, I contacted a 4H Advisor that was certified to do NPIP testing and asked her to help me, it took less than a half hour for drawing the blood on 4 birds with me holding the birds and her drawing the blood, they get 2 dollars a bird for NPIP, I think I gave her 15 and she said that was fine, I purchased the syringes at TSC for about 5 to 6 dollars, I got the needles the vet told me to get, I purchased the blood tubes from a Vet in another town for about 1 dollar each, I sent the blood to the Lab thru Fed-Ex, they are the only shipper that will ship blood, found that out by calling all of them, I paid the most for shipping which was about 30 dollars if I remember right, because I wanted it to get to the Lab ASAP, it arrived the next morning before 10am at the Lab and they began testing, I knew within 3 days what my birds had and how bad it was, the vet told me to test both of the Marans and to pick 2 of my other birds that got the symptoms first, that wasn't hard to do I only had about 16 other birds and they all had names and came when I called them, anyone of them I could go outside and pick up out of the yard, after the vet was done and he did more than one test on the samples he did 3 I think on each of the samples, he told me he did that because there can be a false positive reading and to make for sure they actually grew the stuff from the blood I sent them, and the vet told me from the blood titers that the Marans had it first and the others got it from the Marans, and he told me the Marans were the carriers, needless to say I knew nothing of how this worked at this point, that was when I got quite the education on Mycoplasmas, and my birds had Mycoplasma Synoviae and Mycoplasma Gallisepticum both, the vet also told me about the strains, and he told me I had a very viralent and strong strains of it and that I would never get rid of it, and that I needed to depopulate. That was the first time I had ever even heard the word Depopulate, I had to ask what he meant, I still don't like that word. I had to get rid of all my birds, any idea how hard that was when they all had names and were pets, I didn't have my birds for eating them, I had them for their eggs and as pets for my enjoyment to watch and intermingle with, so I was pretty well devastated.

It was after I had to get rid of my birds that I found what I use on the birds I have now and searched for clean tested birds, and like I said it took me about 2 years to locate and get them, so I'm pretty careful of any other birds I have, I normally don't take birds or eggs that aren't from tested flocks without knowing their conditions first. And then I treat my birds monthly with what I use for a Mycoplasma control program.

Almost forgot the Lab that did the testing charged me 56.04 for testing of the 4 birds, after it was all done and over with I had around 100 dollars in getting the 4 birds tested, I would have paid 300 just for the Ohio Lab to see them and the costs of the same tests were higher here in Ohio than what I paid for the out of state costs.
So I can tell you how to test and where to send the samples for testing.

After I got rid of my birds I had to dissinfect and clean everything and wait 6 months before getting new birds and was told to try and find birds that was tested clean of all diseaes, which is more than the NPIP testing normally, the other tests have to be asked for and most don't ask for the other tests because of the cost. So it took me almost 2 years to locate and get my birds, in the time I was waiting I kept searching for a cure for the Mycoplasmas in the birds, and what I use is what I found, I could have kept it to myself since I was the only one that found it and kept persuing what I found, what I use is not available here, oddly enough its made here was what I was told and shipped to Europe where it is labeled for use with pigs and poultry, I found what we have here, same drug, a little different amount, so we are using it off label for the poultry and using the European sites information for dosages and precautions, and it does work. After as long as I waited to get my birds I wanted to have something to try and keep them clean of it, no way did I want that back again. I use Tek-trol aerosol spray for when I go to get feed or around other poultry to spray my clothes and shoes and nomally take an extra pair of shoes so when I reach my vehicle I can change shoes and put the others in a bag, after any poultry show I go thru the car wash before coming home, that is how I try to make sure I don't bring anything home.

I did just recently take 2 Hens in that I know have Mycoplasma, I am currently treating them and am getting results with what I use, when I do testing here in about the next month I will know what the levels are for the birds I have recently acquired, and like I said normally I don't take the chance, I knew ahead of time the birds condition, what I use is specifically designed to work with Mycoplasma as a preventative and a treatment and will only work for the Mycoplasmas, so I know that is what it is, if it wasn't I wouldn't be getting results. And the only reason why I took these 2 Hens is because they are very rare and practically non existant. What I use also keeps most strains of mycoplasmas from passing to the eggs. I will feel better after I get the testing done, and I have done so much testing with my birds at different time, that I have decided this coming Spring to become an NPIP tester, and am on the list for them to call when the program for testing starts. I figure that is the best way for me to help others to help their birds.
 

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