I'm wondering how many of us would have chickens test positive for mg? VERY scary.
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I have a missing bird in transit as well!was shipped a bresse roo yesterday from San Diego and no scan since San Diego.....
All this USPS garbage just makes me grumpy. I wish there was some other way to move live birds, at least. Why should birds be languishing in a facility somewhere suffering from lack of water or being cold, with people walking right past them moving other boxes first! Of everything that's marked express or priority, I should think living animals should be first in those lines. The heck with dry ice! It's replaceable!
And despite all the problems, I'm still happy to say that I get to extend my hatching until the end of May! Since hubby wants to keep turkeys, I told him I still want to get rid of the remaining crosses and go with a single breed. I can either push my NPIP testing back another month or two, orwait until next year to get poults. We opted to get poults now, and push back the NPIP. So, I get to order poults for delivery in May. That means I also get to hatch in May! Since Krafty is coming up early May and may bring eggs, I'm using that as my new cut off. Eggs must be in the incubator by May 6. That allows me to collect eggs from our trip too, if anyone has anything on my list!
So now I get to watch the swap and auction and BIN threads again!
Careful with my eggs, USPS!
I take back every terrible thing I saix about the usps today, at least. Both boxes of birds are in Tennessee. They got bumped for dry ice shippment with about 30 other boxes of live birds. They put them in a warm room last night, gave them water and grapes. The msp hub supervisor fianally found the Tennessee supervisior, told you there was a phone...., he found my boxes from reese and EVERY single bird is alive and chirping happily. He didnt check on the one from cof, but said they are all together. s She promised they are headed for the plane right now and will be here in a couple of hours. Thank you all....ill update.
x20000
dont stop enjoying your birds because of something you can not control (wild birds)
how old are they? by 30 days there is no heat lamp for ducklings
Please tell me I am not the only one OCD about boxes of live birds I ship out? I track them from my phone with the USPS ap, its so easy really. Print the labels apply to the boxes, scan the barcode and make a note of what and where. Then I can watch when they arrive somewhere (if they are scanned), when they arrive at the receiving PO, and when the person getting them actually picks them up. The last comes in handy the most since we have had some not track the birds themselves.
Well, I can almost guarantee that I can at least compete with almost anyone here for worst day. And it takes a lot to write this when all I want to do is crawl in to a hole.
I brought home some adult birds on Valentines day. They were to be the start of my Dorking program and I was terribly excited about getting them. I have had them in quarantine now for almost 2 months. Because they seemed fine after 4 weeks, I have relaxed my quarantine procedures a bit for the last few weeks…(not washing hands or feet etc) but I haven’t let them out with my others because been building a coop/separate area for them ( & didn’t want them interbreeding with my Barnevelders) Well last week one of the roosters started sneezing and got gurgly in the chest. I sat out there with them to observe for a while and realized that two of them were sniffly. So I bit the bullet and took the two birds to the state testing lab on Friday.
I just got the results today. MG.
My immediate reaction was: horror… CULL!
But I just got off the phone with the guy...Straining to understand him.
But the salient points are:
- Most (75%-90%) backyard flocks have MG(???!!!???!!!!) but because there are many strains, and many are not serious, most people don’t know they have it.
- Evidently MG is a pandemic on the east coast in house finches and many on the east coast are carriers. (Also American goldfinches, purple finches, evening grosbeaks and pine grosbeaks.) My Quarantine pen is right under the birdfeeder on our deck where we feed all of these birds BOSS. Some of it falls through and the birds go in to get it.
- Even if I destroy these birds, my flock is at risk forever because it is in the local wild bird population and unless I stop free ranging and put them in a building where they can have no access to wild birds, they can pick it up. This would mean hardware cloth small enough that a finch can’t get through and roof so that a wild bird can’t poop into the run. (2 years ago before I even had chickens I rescued a blind house finch from my garden and nursed it back to health…I just didn’t know that THAT was MG)
- MG can get passed through to the egg in a bird that is actively shedding. The PCR test indicated that the birds were not shedding much (if at all.) I have no idea if my Barnevelders have been exposed but it takes two weeks to become infected. These guys only started coughing last week. And I have had them in Quarantine…but one of the scenarios is that they got it from the wild birds here.
- Most hatcheries don’t test for MG. NPIP makes you test for Pullorium and sometimes AI but they don’t care about MG because it can’t be transmitted to humans. So you can even get it from NPIP certified breeders.
I have seen no symptoms at all in my real flock. But that doesn’t mean that they don’t have it or are not carriers. 2-5% of birds who get over the disease become carriers and this is such a mild strain that it is hard to say. Just sniffles, no morbidity. And the fact that I take really good care of my birds and they are not at all stressed EVER would allow this to hide more easily.
So at the very least, my flock is now closed. I will be waiting a month or so for anything to manifest and then have blood testing done on my whole flock. I have some hard decisions to make. If this is in the local bird population…and I know it is, there isn’t anything I can do to not eventually get it if I want to free-range my chickens.
To anyone who has hatched out chicks from me I apologize most profoundly. I tried to do the best with Biosecurity that I could. I have some reason to believe that my eggs to this point have been safe as my girls have never shown any symptoms, but there is always a chance and I don’t blame you if you are worried &/or angry.
Anyone I owe eggs to I will pay off with paypal. Please send me your paypal address.
So now I will never breed any chickens. I will keep the females for eggs and a friend will help me dispatch the males. I will not sell eggs or chicks. My chicken plans are now shattered into a million pieces.
I am so sorry. Is there any way to figure out if it is from the wild birds? Fingers crossed that is was brought in from the adult birds and your others are free. I don't even know what to say to tell you how sorry I am.Well, I can almost guarantee that I can at least compete with almost anyone here for worst day. And it takes a lot to write this when all I want to do is crawl in to a hole.
I brought home some adult birds on Valentines day. They were to be the start of my Dorking program and I was terribly excited about getting them. I have had them in quarantine now for almost 2 months. Because they seemed fine after 4 weeks, I have relaxed my quarantine procedures a bit for the last few weeks…(not washing hands or feet etc) but I haven’t let them out with my others because been building a coop/separate area for them ( & didn’t want them interbreeding with my Barnevelders) Well last week one of the roosters started sneezing and got gurgly in the chest. I sat out there with them to observe for a while and realized that two of them were sniffly. So I bit the bullet and took the two birds to the state testing lab on Friday.
I just got the results today. MG.
My immediate reaction was: horror… CULL!
But I just got off the phone with the guy...Straining to understand him.
But the salient points are:
- Most (75%-90%) backyard flocks have MG(???!!!???!!!!) but because there are many strains, and many are not serious, most people don’t know they have it.
- Evidently MG is a pandemic on the east coast in house finches and many on the east coast are carriers. (Also American goldfinches, purple finches, evening grosbeaks and pine grosbeaks.) My Quarantine pen is right under the birdfeeder on our deck where we feed all of these birds BOSS. Some of it falls through and the birds go in to get it.
- Even if I destroy these birds, my flock is at risk forever because it is in the local wild bird population and unless I stop free ranging and put them in a building where they can have no access to wild birds, they can pick it up. This would mean hardware cloth small enough that a finch can’t get through and roof so that a wild bird can’t poop into the run. (2 years ago before I even had chickens I rescued a blind house finch from my garden and nursed it back to health…I just didn’t know that THAT was MG)
- MG can get passed through to the egg in a bird that is actively shedding. The PCR test indicated that the birds were not shedding much (if at all.) I have no idea if my Barnevelders have been exposed but it takes two weeks to become infected. These guys only started coughing last week. And I have had them in Quarantine…but one of the scenarios is that they got it from the wild birds here.
- Most hatcheries don’t test for MG. NPIP makes you test for Pullorium and sometimes AI but they don’t care about MG because it can’t be transmitted to humans. So you can even get it from NPIP certified breeders.
I have seen no symptoms at all in my real flock. But that doesn’t mean that they don’t have it or are not carriers. 2-5% of birds who get over the disease become carriers and this is such a mild strain that it is hard to say. Just sniffles, no morbidity. And the fact that I take really good care of my birds and they are not at all stressed EVER would allow this to hide more easily.
So at the very least, my flock is now closed. I will be waiting a month or so for anything to manifest and then have blood testing done on my whole flock. I have some hard decisions to make. If this is in the local bird population…and I know it is, there isn’t anything I can do to not eventually get it if I want to free-range my chickens.
To anyone who has hatched out chicks from me I apologize most profoundly. I tried to do the best with Biosecurity that I could. I have some reason to believe that my eggs to this point have been safe as my girls have never shown any symptoms, but there is always a chance and I don’t blame you if you are worried &/or angry.
Anyone I owe eggs to I will pay off with paypal. Please send me your paypal address.
So now I will never breed any chickens. I will keep the females for eggs and a friend will help me dispatch the males. I will not sell eggs or chicks. My chicken plans are now shattered into a million pieces.
Okay, one of you sent my the stomach flu through the net. Who did it? Come on, fess up.
Good gracious this is no time to get sick.
How do you post a question on here or do you just jump in a thread, like I just did? I'm new here and have lots of questions. Sorry to step in like this.
https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/733198/paypal-hatching-eggs-chicks-swapHow do you post a question on here or do you just jump in a thread, like I just did? I'm new here and have lots of questions. Sorry to step in like this.
A lot of you questions will probably be answered by reading the info on this link.![]()