Marek's? Should I cull? I'd like to resolve tonight if possible...

[Nambroth]

This sounded bad too, I didn't want my birds to always be carriers of some untreatable disease. So I did some more research and found out that mareks is so common that almost every chicken on the planet has been exposed to it or will be sooner or later, so almost every adult chicken is a possible "carrier". Most chickens develop a natural resistance to mareks by sexual maturity, so adult chickens are generally not affected.

So it turns out mareks isn't as bad as I thought, it's everywhere and if your chicks are vaccinated you don't have anything to worry about, and if they aren't you only have to worry about them getting it until about 5 months. My birds are getting it at 9 months but that is because it has a long incubation period and my birds were integrated with the adult birds too early so they probably caught the disease at 4-5 months and are just now exhibiting symptoms.

This is a bit misleading. There are strains of Marek's, MDV-1v+ etc, that are virulent and can challenge the most commonly used vaccines. Much to the sadness of many of our members here, vaccination alone does not mean you have nothing to worry about. Vaccinated birds can still develop symptoms and die if the vaccine is challenged by a virulent strain.

Also, birds of any age can develop it, though it is MOST common in younger birds.


Also roosters are less susceptible.
All my favorite chickens are roosters well over a year old so I'm hoping they are past the point of being susceptiblity.

THere is a lot of helpful information, however I have read a lot of conflicting data about culling and vaccinating. Some people say cull and or never breed affected, so say the affected will breed more resistant offspring. I have also read that the vaccine is useless in birds over a few days old, a few weeks old, and some study's say it works on adult birds too and that giving the vaccine to birds already infected and exhibiting symptoms may actually help it produce antibodies and recover. Like the rest of poultry keeping there is a mix of information, all of it good but its best to sift though all of it and use your best judgment on the best approach for your individual flock.

I've accumulated as much information here as possible, if you are interested: https://www.backyardchickens.com/a/the-great-big-giant-mareks-disease-faq

As always, if anyone has proof contrary to the things in my article please let me know. I want to be corrected if I am wrong!

There is a lot about this disease that we simply aren't "sure" about, sadly.

 

[LoriC]

I'm very sad to say that I lost my favorite 'roo, Peep, and I'm 99.9% sure it was Marek's. As a chick (he was born in June) he had a paralyzed leg. I took him to the vet, and the leg was fine. It got better on its own. He grew into a gorgeous roo! But when I went out to close them up the other night, I found him laying on his back, dead. There were not any marks on him, so I'm confident it was Marek's. I have not lost any of the rest of the flock. I guess we will see how things go. But I'm very sad about loosing Peep

 

[casportpony]

Sorry for your loss.

-Kathy

 

[Perfect Polish]

I had 4 hens die for uknown resons. One was weak and it got to the point she couldnt walk. The others eyes got swollen shut and gross looking. One couldnt walk and died about a weak later and one was fine one day and the next was kind acting weird and i came to let them out the next morning and she was dead. are these all cases of mareks?