Is it wrong . . . EDIT: Check out page 3 for discovery!

[speckledhen]

I don't have your answers. That's why you need to talk to a state poultry lab. Usually, you can call them and talk over the phone and they can offer sound guidance. So many diseases can have similar symptoms, that unless you have a real diagnosis, you'll never be certain of what you're dealing with. A phone call would be worth it.

 

[Chickenaddict]

Quote:
Ditto!

 

[Marthab1953]

ICallMyselfCherie' :

Hi, everybody. I need to ask a very serious question.

I have just started a Serama breeding business and have just barely gotten my breeding stock up enough and raised enough birds where I can start selling them. Now, just as I am about to begin selling, one of my hens -- not a serama, but another type of hen who has been in the vicinity of the seramas during illness -- has developed paralysis. After all of my research, I must consider the strong possibility that she has Marek's. From what I hear it can take months for the disease to show up in other birds. Here I am with a fledgling business that NEEDS to start earning back money, but I am devastated to think it would be unethical to sell these birds in light of the fact that they may have been exposed to this horrific disease.

I bought my breeder stock with savings bonds I've had since I was a child. I've sunk about three thousand dollars into getting the best parent stock possible, cages, etc. It is nearly all the money I have to my name. This is my full-time job. If I cannot sell the offspring, it will ruin me.

Please give me your opinions on this matter. I could really use some help.

Thank you.

If there is something wrong with birds in your flock you should never sell any to others till your own flock is clean.​

 

[Chickenaddict]

ICallMyselfCherie' :

Thank you for the support, speckledhen, it helps so much not to feel alone. The difficult thing is, this hen seems to finally be out of the woods. To nurse her through this hard time for so long, only to put her down just when she's getting better, feels too cruel to bare. You see, I thought at the start that it was Mareks, but after talking to people on here for quite a while and getting some very helpful input suggesting other causes, I decided against that possibility. The symptoms didn't quite fit, the way I'd heard them described, and I so wanted to believe it was something else. But tonight I signed on here and found a post from one last person, linking me to her thread that described the EXACT symptoms, which had turned out to be Mareks. This is the reason I've dealt with things the way I have . . . now it seems that I've made all the wrong decisions. I could see my way through to putting her down when she was at the worst of it . . . but now, up and around, with so much more life in her . . . I just don't know if I can do it.

What if I were to treat everything exactly as I would if I had her put down, had a necropsy done, and it came back Mareks? Scrubbed everything down, sanitized the heck out of everything, vaccinated every new chick that hatched, used the extra vaccine to inject all the other birds just in case it might help for prevention if they haven't been exposed, even though they are older (what could it hurt?) . . . but just kept her as a pet. I would keep her quarantined from everyone else. It wouldn't be easy. I would have to scrub up between contact with her and other birds, change my clothes, everything. But if I was willing to do it -- could it work?

Anything can work if you set your mind to it! Im gonna tell you a little story about a rescue I did a few years ago. I heard about a little frizzle hen who was in bad bad shape at a farm kind of far away from me. This man had lots of birds and bunnies housed in the same building, no bedding on the dirt floor which was just massive piles of frozen poop. Noone in their right mind would ever leave with a bird from this guy but I couldn't leave that poor girl there like that. I took her and 4 others home. I practiced the most strict biosecurity when dealing with these birds. They were quarentined far far away from my flock. I washed up, changed clothes and handled them with gloves on. Every one of them was suffering from CRD. The 4 cochins I took home with the frizzle were culled because they would remain carriers for life. But the frizzle hen never was sick like them but had been exposed to them at the farm I got them from so she lived the rest of her life in the house with me. She didn't live very long as she was already 6 years old when I got her but at least the last year of her life was spent in total comfort and in a very loving environment with lots of sttention from the cat who adored her as well as me. SO yes it can be done.​

 

[Cheapchicksfarm]

If you are trying to build a business and are really serious about building a good solid reputation as a excellent breeder then you need to put her down and have her tested if the vet says to do so.

Call a state vet ASAP!!!

Sometimes we have to sacrifice one for the many that is one of the down sides of being a responsible breeder I know it is hard and I do feel for you

 

[stormylady]

What if I were to treat everything exactly as I would if I had her put down, had a necropsy done, and it came back Mareks? Scrubbed everything down, sanitized the heck out of everything, vaccinated every new chick that hatched, used the extra vaccine to inject all the other birds just in case it might help for prevention if they haven't been exposed, even though they are older (what could it hurt?) . . . but just kept her as a pet. I would keep her quarantined from everyone else. It wouldn't be easy. I would have to scrub up between contact with her and other birds, change my clothes, everything. But if I was willing to do it -- could it work?


The question is, would you really be comfortable selling birds that might be carriers or even sick that looked healthy ?? As a buyer I would not be comfortable buying birds from you, Not trying to be harsh here, but I would be devestated if I were to buy your birds and wind up having to lose my flock to something like this. I know its hard to put a animal down but really the test results will solve alot of your delima at least if you know the truth, you could tell perspective buyer the truth. It could be something else but your really not going to know the truth and be able to be honest with the customers without doing it, Please do the right thing, I know you want to but its hard losing something that means so much to you. I Wish you the best, Sandy

 

[ICallMyselfCherie']

No, I would not be comfortable with that, that is why I'm trying to fix the situation. I don't want to put her down if there are other options.

And I'm glad it was worth it to me to look in to those options. Check this out.

http://aem.asm.org/content/23/5/942.full.pdf

I'm going to search out someone who can do THAT.

 

[stormylady]

ICallMyselfCherie' :

No, I would not be comfortable with that, that is why I'm trying to fix the situation. I don't want to put her down if there are other options.

And I'm glad it was worth it to me to look in to those options. Check this out.

http://aem.asm.org/content/23/5/942.full.pdf

I'm going to search out someone who can do THAT.

I think that its wonderful that you won't have to put her down to have the test run!! I do hope that her test come back that she did not have Mereks,

I was not trying to upset you or make you think that I thought you were going to be dishonest with the customer that would buy your birds.
I know you were desperate to find away to solve the possible issue with out having to put your girl down.

I have to admit that I was kinda dismayed at the "scenero" if she did have Mereks I could do this....keep her in the house away from the other chickens and so on til I got to whats the harm part?? the problem I saw with all that pretending that treating it like it was real but not really having the tests done, you would never really know that your birds either had the actual physical symtoms or were carriers or not, what would you tell you customers, that your birds are possible carriers of Mereks? I'm pretty sure that wouldn't work with your customers. It would be so much better to just have the test done so you could be honest to your customers , Which now looks like a very possible thing because if I'm reading the link right all they do is test the feathers for it right? I think that is Awesome!

I am sorry if I misunderstood what you were saying in the last paragraph. I do appologize.

 

[ICallMyselfCherie']

Yes, all they would have to do is test a feather!!

No, I wasn't saying I had decided to do that, I was just posing the question to see what other people thought. And when I said "what could it hurt?" I was referring to giving the extra doses of the vaccine to my older birds, NOT "what could it hurt" to keep a sick bird around. Meaning, they give you a thousand doses, why not use them when it is said that the vaccine can still be effective in older birds as long as they haven't been exposed. I am just trying to talk myself through all the options, even if they're not very good ones, and get feedback and support. As I said, if I have to take the the financial hit, I will do that before I would sell birds who might be sick.

 

[stormylady]

Oh ok gotcha! see I did read that wrong and Im so sorry! and I didn't read all the info apparently, need to go back and read the whole thread tomarrow. Thankyou for clearing that up for me.

Sandy