Mareks in my flock?

[Fire Ant Farm]

I'm so sorry you're going through this. But you really, REALLY need to get a necropsy done on your birds when they die, so you know what's killing them. @ChickenCanoe is in Missouri and knows where you can send them, etc.

- Ant Farm

 

[DwayneNLiz]

X2

I'm so sorry you're going through this. But you really, REALLY need to get a necropsy done on your birds when they die, so you know what's killing them. @ChickenCanoe
 is in Missouri and knows where you can send them, etc. 

- Ant Farm 

x2 or if you remind me tomorrow I can look it up for you @microchick

 

[microchick]

I'm so sorry you're going through this. But you really, REALLY need to get a necropsy done on your birds when they die, so you know what's killing them. @ChickenCanoe is in Missouri and knows where you can send them, etc.

- Ant Farm

Thank you Fire Ant Farm. And I've come to that conclusion and started hunting for a facility. So far I've found two, Mizzou's Veterinary College in Columbia does them and so does the MO dept of Ag's labs in both Jeff City and Springfield. I'm kind of in sticker shock at their prices so next week I'm going to call the local Ag office and find out their base costs for a necropsy to diagnose possible Marek's disease.

I'm also going to talk to our vet. He doesn't do chickens but he does necropsy's on mammals so maybe I can talk him into doing one on my next bird that dies.

Yes, I should have probably done one before now. My last death was buried for days before I saw the pullet who had developing grey eye. Denial is a beautiful thing tho and when you loose a bird you just don't stop to think that it could be something as serious as Marek's especially when the symptoms are so cryptic.

Something somebody may know the answer to. So far, thank God, this is just happening in my Orpington line, Buff, Lavender and on Buff O/Welsummer cross. Four deaths were roosters/cockerels, one rooster with a pin point pupil, two hens with pen point pupils. I also have a year old Buff O rooster that isn't doing well even after being wormed and treated for a throat infection. The one thing so far they all have in common is that are all Orpingtons or half Orpingtons. I've checked the rest of my birds. The Welsummers are asymptomatic. My Speckled Sussex is asymptomatic and so are my OEGBs that are all under one year.

Dare I hope that the others have an immune system that is keeping them from getting full blown sick? Is it possible that there is a glitch in my BO immune systems?

 

[jenniferlamar70]

Hi everyone.

This is one of those threads that you hope you never have to post on but if you do, it's sooooo reassuring to see familiar names with the same common problem.

I am beginning to think that I have Marek's in my flock.

Over the past year I have had mysterious deaths of 5 young birds (7 months to 14 months) and one 1 week chick. The first was a 14 month old rooster, the picture of health until over a three week period he rapidly lost weight, stopped crowing, his comb turned flaky white and shrank. I had wormed for coccidia two weeks prior to the onset of symptoms and until the onset he had been a robust, healthy boy..he's my avatar in fact. We tried everything from reworming to terramycin and in spite of our best efforts, he died.

Next was a big beautiful Lavender O rooster, also 14 months old. Sudden weight loss, stood with head on breast (Hunkered down, I call it). Within a week we found him on his back, dead from a suspected sudden death heart attack.

Then there was a lively 7 month old BO cockerel who developed some quirky neuro problem. He would suddenly stop and flap around as if having a seizure. This started happening more often and became more prolonged until we couldn't touch him without him seizing. I put him down.

Last month, another BO cockerel 13 months old died suddenly. A month earlier he had suddenly started not acting right. He stood and walked very upright, almost on his toes and if you tried to touch him, he would suddenly start spinning in circles and flapping his wings until he was spinning around on a shoulder. He also started walking in slow circles. I found him laying in the run one Sunday morning, barely alive. I picked him up to discover that his comb was blue at the tips, his breathing slightly labored and he slowly slipped into unconsciousness and died in my arms within 15 minutes.

I began drawing things together last week. I have a hen, two years old who last year, late summer I noticed has irregular pupils. One mostly normal, a bit sluggish to light response and the other pin point. Her eyes have remained normal color though. her weight is average. She has always been a little on the lean side but holds her weight well and is a dependable broody/layer. Another rooster, also 1 year 2 months old developed a pin point pupil about the same time. Solid built, not skinny in the least, active breeder and a gentle boy with people. He's my baby. The third hen developed a pin point pupil probably about the same time and like the other two, iris color remained unchanged until last week when I looked at her and said.....oh crap. The pin point eye is turning from gold to green with a touch of washed out yellow to it. All three's pupils are slightly and I mean slightly responsive to light but I can't ignore the color change. I thought at first the weird pupils could have been caused by rough mating or the rooster fighting with the other boys (I have 6 standards and 2 bantam roosters/cockerels) My husband is an eye doctor and he is going to check their bad eyes for me to see if there is an active Uveitis going on.

The chick that died at one week just wasn't thrifty at all. It ate, followed mom around but didn't thrive. I really didn't see anything that looked overtly Marek's except that it liked to walk with it's wings drooping a bit toward the end.

The change in eye color has me spooked and for the last week I've been reading everything I could find, finally latching on to a few medical grade reports that mentioned sudden death from cardiac tumors and neurological deficits in Marek's disease along with how symptoms could be masked and atypical-brain tumors could cause seizure activity.

History of my flock is that I have 24 standard sized and 24 OEGBs ranging from 26 months to 5 weeks of age. I bought the standard birds from an NPIP breeder who breeds for resistance and does not vaccinate their chicks. There had been no birds on our property for 6 years when I started my flock. My bantams were started by hatching eggs I got last Sept and recently from an Amish neighbor who has a flock of healthy birds.

My birds are wormed regularly, eat ADM and MFA gae bird feed with sunflower and scratch on the side. No free ranging. We live deep rural with Amish farms and free range chickens around us. None come on our property but bio security is only as good as the wind direction and speed lets it be if you get my drift.

So. Where to from here?

Closed flock-done. I can hatch my own chicks if need arises. No problem there.

Biosecurity?

Once again, only as good as the wind, flies and wild birds lets it be.

So far my bantams are hale and hardy. No weird anything going on and no more birds have developed weird pupils. The magic age seems to be 7-14 months for the range of deaths. The Two year olds with the funky pupils puzzles me though. They are not declining but seem stable and happy. The unequal pupils have been that way for almost a year on one. No weight loss, no paralysis, no prolapses, nada. I have not had a necropsy done. I thought about it with the last death per suggestion by @casportpony
 but it was only a few days later that I saw the eye color change and began to put two and two together.

It's like the old saying goes, if it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck and swims like a duck, well you know.........

Can I assume that for the time being these birds are stable?  Have they, with their resistant breeding developed enough anitbodies that they are being protected from the disease progressing?

I love my birds. Naturally this is breaking my heart but better to know than not. It's been driving me nutz trying to figure out what has been killing off my birds over the last year. I can deal with the disease being a retired nurse. I know I will be loosing birds from time to time but now I'm kicking myself in the bum mentally for not buying vaccinated birds. I feel as though I've let my flock down by accepting disease resistant higher quality birds over lower quality hatchery chicks that have been vaccinated. 

Thanks for reading everyone. Any help is greatly appreciated by a tearful flock owner.

First off I am so sorry for your loss. This has been a difficult time for me as well and I understand the denial aspect and not wanting that to be the answer. The only way to know for sure though is to have a necropsy done. Their are lots of other things that can present like mareks so even with obvious symptoms I think the diagnosis isnt always so clear cut. You said you purchased your standards from a breeder breeding for for resistance. I don't know much about that yet but I thought when they do that their is usually mareks in the flock already. I'm not positive on this. Nowhere near sure so double check. If thats the case though it would be easy to see how it entered the flock. I've found its hard to prevent spreading even in seperate coops. Hopefully someone with more experience here can help you more then me.

hugs.

 

[microchick]

First off I am so sorry for your loss. This has been a difficult time for me as well and I understand the denial aspect and not wanting that to be the answer. The only way to know for sure though is to have a necropsy done. Their are lots of other things that can present like mareks so even with obvious symptoms I think the diagnosis isnt always so clear cut. You said you purchased your standards from a breeder breeding for for resistance. I don't know much about that yet but I thought when they do that their is usually mareks in the flock already. I'm not positive on this. Nowhere near sure so double check. If thats the case though it would be easy to see how it entered the flock. I've found its hard to prevent spreading even in seperate coops. Hopefully someone with more experience here can help you more then me.

hugs.

@Jenniferlamar70, thank you so much for your kind words.

In all honest, I hadn't thought about that but that is a valid point about breeding for resistance. I read that and did a head slap. Makes sense and would explain how the virus entered the flock. Along with chicks, I bought several young pullets and a cockerel from the same breeder.From the original flock of chicks I have lost one rooster and have one hen with pin point pupils. The cockerel I bought 4 months older died of sudden cardiac problems at the age of 14 months and his daughter died at the age of 7 weeks.

Unfortunately, yes, I do realize that my entire flock has been exposed. I'm hoping that the OEGB bantams have tough enough immune systems to survive and realize that I will loose other birds from time to time. I have an incubator and can hatch my own if I want to increase my flock. I'm happy with my birds and love each and every one of them. They are stuck with me as their owner and I'll give them the best care possible.

Yes, I am going to have a necropsy done on my next loss. The prices I have found that the two sites charge in MO are chuckleatious. I am going to talk to our vet and if he can't help me I'll do my own. I've looked at so many tumorous livers and other assorted chicken innards the past week that I could probably bumble my way through a dissection if I had to..

 

[perchie.girl]

Quote:
OMG.....

 

[microchick]

Update:

Yesterday I called Mizzou and was able to talk to one of the doctors in their Veterinary Medicine Lab-a very nice man who was insightful as to what I told him was going on in my flock and told me about their services. We will definitely be driving the hour and a half drive down to Columbia when we loose our next bird and having a necropsy done.

One thing I'm beginning to realize and we have been discussing over on the Old Folks Home is that breeding for resistance is a joke, or maybe not a joke, but definitely misleading.

@seminolewind you come highly recommended for your knowledge about Marek's disease.

 

[chickengeorgeto]

Can someone please explain mareks to me. We had a bird die and sent in for a necropsy. They said she died from mareks. What does this mean for the rest of my flock? Do they all have it then? Can I still vaccinate if they don't?

Mareks is a form of cancer that comes from being infected with a virus similar to the virus that causes herpes.

The Marek virus is everywhere. Furthermore there are numerous forms or strains of Marek disease and everyone requires its own vaccine.

Once your birds contracts Marek's it will shed the virus for as long as it lives, becoming a Mareks Marry who will infect your healthy birds.

PS: Gander Eye, Mareks of the eyes AKA ocular Mareks is very common. In fact any organ on your chicken is at risk from Marek's

PPS: If one is breeding for resistance to Marek's then the only way that you can know if you are succeeding is to have some Marek's in your flock.

 

[seminolewind]

Update:

Yesterday I called Mizzou and was able to talk to one of the doctors in their Veterinary Medicine Lab-a very nice man who was insightful as to what I told him was going on in my flock and told me about their services. We will definitely be driving the hour and a half drive down to Columbia when we loose our next bird and having a necropsy done.

One thing I'm beginning to realize and we have been discussing over on the Old Folks Home is that breeding for resistance is a joke, or maybe not a joke, but definitely misleading.

@seminolewind you come highly recommended for your knowledge about Marek's disease.

My whole post went poof!
Sorry about your chicken. It hurts with every death.

Resistance is when a body gets a small or "safe" exposure and reacts by building antibodies. Like a vaccine. Or an older chicken who's had a few years to build antibodies. Or one time I inadvertently exposed a rooster 4-6 weeks old for 4 weeks, then he went to live on a farm for 4 months and came back to me. He died at 5 years old of what appeared to be aspergillosis. I've also had 2 one year olds and a 3 year old die from Marek's symptoms even tho they were vaccinated and quarantined as chicks.

But those who try to breed for resistance give us more education whether it works out or not.

If you understand how colds, herpes, or HIV work it's easier to understand Marek's

The best we can do is let our current chickens live out their lives, and vaccinate and quarantine chicks you may get. I hatched 10 silkies 3 years ago and still have all 10. I had vaccinated them myself.

Nasty disease. I'm sick of it!

 

[seminolewind]

Quote: "Marek's Mary" ! You had me laughing with that one!