Help!!! Giving up baby chicks because of Salmonella article!

[MTchick]

There is a vaccine for commercial farms available. It is theorectically possible you could get it from a vet or if you live in an area with chicken farmers, you could make friends with one and see if you could get a few doses.

I have NO idea how complicated this might be, but I did google "salmonella vaccine" and it immediately gave a bunch of results on successful chicken vaccination programs in the UK and USA. Might be worth looking into for your peace of mind.

-MTchick

 

[blue90292]

proper hygeine and common sense should keep everything fine.

my mom has nightmares that my son will die a horrid death because we live amongst dog poo, cat poo, horse poo, cow poo and now i've added chicken poo.

i do probably wash clothes and such more than most people and i have several bottles of either clorox spray or windex at hand to keep things clean.

my son is 5 and i think he's got the best immune system around.

 

[chickbea]

I wouldn't worry at all. There are many studies being done in Europe that show that children who are raised on farms and in rural areas are much healthier in general than kids who are raised in urban and mainly indoor environments. In my opinion, the more dirt a kid gets into, the better their immune system will work!

 

[CranberryBirds]

I blame this 100% on the media. The only benefit I see from this story is that PERHAPS people who were planning on buying "dyed" easter chicks now will not do so.

However, for the home hobbyist, I say get the chicks, keep the chicks, and don't worry about it.

Yes, you might have to make tough parenting decisions (ie, the first time he "forgets" to wash his hands, no touching the chicks for 1 day, 2 days, 1 week, whatever; no one gets the chicks out when you're at work, etc.) and stick by your rules. A 5-year old is old enough to understand consequences and work within the rules if he has to.

Seriously, this reminds me of the recent Time magazine article on what Americans worry about. Basically, we worry about all the wrong things. (And worrying causes stress which is proven to shorten life-spans, oh no!) Do you put your kids in the car and take them somewhere? Even somewhere that isn't "necessary"? If so, you're putting them at way more risk than you may be by getting some chickens that you do not "need." Not to make you paranoid about driving somewhere, but so many every day activities, food items, household products, etc are jsut as dangerous/more dangerous than the slim chance of getting a bug from your chicks.

IMO, you should take a deep breath and have a serious talk with your kid about how important this is to you. If he can't deal with the rules, then hands off for him--permenantly--and truly will just be YOUR chickens.

Good luck.

 

[homechick]

Wow.. I'm feeling some hope here. If I can convince grandma then I'm all set to live out my dream of throwing scrach on the ground and cuddling chickens under my shirt like I did as a kid. ha ha.

 

[dlhunicorn]

There is a principle called "competitive exclusion" ...I have some articles on it here:
http://dlhunicorn.conforums.com/ind...estoantibiotics&action=display&num=1158484109

Not saying it will get rid of the salmonella danger...however you can control this with your management practices and common sense supervision of your children (btw ANY animals particularly cats are "dangerous" in transferring nasties to people). I give my chickies yhogurt and my birds yogurt/probiotics ... have pavers for the coop/run "flooring" (easier and more effective to clean) ... a well thought out management plan with your birds will go far to eliminating any practical dangers to your children.

 

[Wes in Tx]

Homechick

My kids have been around baby chicks since they were 3&5 and have never gotten sick and believe me they aren't the best at washing their hands either.

One thing you must remember about any bacteria out there is that the only way to build imunity to it is to be exposed to small amounts of it.

That story you posted is nothing more than a scare tactic to try and stop the useless promotion of the colored chicks and having all those birds looking of homes after the novelty wears off.

I have been in the sewer buisness for many years and the things I deal with in that field scares me a whole lot more than something I might catch from my birds.

Don't let that article scare you off from those baby chicks.

 

[poppycat]

I'd think that your kids might be more likely to get salmonella from store bought eggs and chicken. It runs rampant on factory-type farms and every time you crack an egg or open a package of chicken you are possibly putting yourself in contact with it, sadly these products need to be treated as a biohazard until they're fully cooked. That's one of the reasons I got my own chickens. They are super healthy and so are my kids, handwashing lapses and all. I think on the whole, raising your own food is a healthier choice for kids.

 

[demonique]

I tend not to worry about things like this. Everything's a scare tactic. You had chickens as a child, homechick - and you didn't get any big scary diseases from them. Tons of people nowadays STILL have chickens, and the vast, vast majority still don't get any big scary diseases from them. But in today's world, if even one person in 300 million gets ill from something and the media picks up on it? Suddenly, they hunt down everyone with a bellache and blow things out of proportion, and things just spiral from there.

I still eat cookie dough with raw eggs in it. I am not going to stop because every once in a while, someone will get sick from it. I have done this for years, my mother did this, my grandmother did this, and so on. I have never known /anyone/ to actually get sick from this. It can't be THAT common.

Same with getting ill from playing with chickens. Or eating carrots straight out of the ground. Or any of the other ten billion things children get into. The more we shelter them, the worse their immune systems will be. And for what? A very small risk of severe illness?

We take risks every day by living. You have, like another poster said, a much greater chance of getting into a car wreck than you do getting sick from playing with your own healthy chickens - and in the event that anyone does, I would bet that in most cases it wouldn't be anywhere near as severe as the stores the media spouts off. They always pick the worst of the worst and lay it out as if it's the most common scenario. That simply isn't the case.

Of course, it's up to you what risks YOU want to take with your family. If this frightens you that much, do what you need to do. But just remember that scare stories are just that - scare stories. Sadly, no story about all the happy chicken owners who don't get sick from their chickens and aren't freaking out about the latest thing to get terrified about would ever catch anybody's attention.

 

[AccidentalFarm]

My grandpa always told me you have to eat a pound of dirt before you die. He didn't mind his kids or his grandkids playing with chickens, dogs, cats, cows, lizards, rolling in the dirt, climbing under the house, eating straight from the garden, catching tadpoles from the horse troughs, and (oh my!) catching bugs with our bare hands....you get the picture. He said getting dirty makes you healthy. And we have been a really healthy bunch!

I love old timers!

It is good to be exposed to germs, it's the way our bodies work to create healthy immune systems- that and eating healthy food (like the eggs your chickies will provide). JMO