Okies in the BYC The Original

[Elwood Lightfoot]

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NPIP stands for National Poultry Improvement Plan, testing is done for a disease called Pullorum. Here is the description from APHIS

Raising chickens, turkeys, and other types of poultry--whether done for profit or pleasure--entails undertaking the serious responsibility of disease prevention. Probably the greatest single factor which limited the early expansion of the U.S. poultry industry was the disease known as Bacillary White Diarrhea (BWD), caused by Salmonella pullorum. This disease, later called pullorum disease, was rampant in poultry and could cause upwards of 80 percent mortality in baby poultry. Poultrymen recognized the problem, but were unable to manage it until the causative organism was discovered by Dr. Leo Rettger in 1899 and a diagnostic blood test was developed by Dr. F.S. Jones in 1913.


The benefits of this plan is that once you have birds tested and the flock certified then you are allowed to use the NPIP logo on any poultry products that come off of your place. It is what is called a value added type of thing as you can charge more for your product if the market will stand it.

AI stands for Avian Influenza which is a nasty disease of which there are many strains, the most publicised of the strains is the H5N1 which is still a major problem world-wide.

When a state inspector comes to test for NPIP they will often take throat cultures and test for AI at no charge to the flock owner.


There are many here on the board that are state certified NPIP testers including me and my wife and they hold classes once a year to become a cert. tester.


Grace, Teva and I usually charge .50 a bird but a lot depends on how far we have to travel. The flock cert. is a five dollar charge from the state.

Thanks NN I should probably look into having my few birds tested soon before I get too many more chickens.

 

[Ivyblaze]

Honestly it worked very very well....I had over 150 rabbits as a kid their hutch was out in the sun, no shade trees. they would crawl up onto the block and lay there sprawled out like a starfish...but if you think about it even a rabbits heat centers are similar to a human and if they can lay on it the hair on their bellies is thinner and they can absorb the coolness into the vital centers of their body much better! We never ever lost a rabbit when doing this! Granted my mom and I were constantly freezing blocks but it worked! We had the huge California Giant rabbits too....they were ginormous!

 

[Sooner]

Monty 6 am is going to hurt! I have made a point of getting up at 6am all summer so it wouldn't hurt me when school started. I am not ready for the running to start. I have a 4 H meeting tonight!

Thanks for the thoughts on the Cochin, considering I can't get anything to hatch out of them I guess I will soon be looking for more.

 

[GracefulBantams]

Thanks Carla and Les for the NPIP information. The testers have come and gone, and it did just cost $5 total.

They did the AI testing again, I was a little upset they didn't tell me, but I guess it's not optional as far as I'm concerned anyway

I just hate that the birds have to have those swabs stuck wayyy down their throats

 

[Ivyblaze]

Here are 3 pics of my chicken run that is being revamped.


Not sure how exaclty to put images on here yet so might be a work in progress!


Deedra

New Coop is going to go along the East side (left of the run)

Chain link is going to go around the entire outside of the run 4 ft out and 3 strands of electrical wire maybe.

Chicken wire or hardware cloth is going along the inside1-2 ft to cover the bottom of the boards...just incase

 

[Ivyblaze]

Sooner- YES I am very proud of myself....you would think being 30 that I would have some idea how to do this but still had to go back and edit it three times

Still don't know why the bf built this thing so dang high though. Maybe he thought I wanted a two story condo run *giggles* Now for the coop and I will be happy. Do you think that this run and a coop will be able to house 30 birds? If not I might have to expand it

Deedra

 

[Grace'sDad]

Quote:

Good to see you back online. Grace has done great, considering our heat. I think she lost a couple of small chicks but she has done a good job of keeping up with all of the others. It's really a lot of Hot work but she will stay with it.
I have seen several other posts where members have lost some. This year is one of the hottest we have had in several years. We have seen 111 a couple of times and 15 days over 103.

 

[poultryand bees]

Grace. I think the Avian Influenza testing is a federally funded program administred by the Dept of Agriculture and helps "underwrite" the NPIP testing. Since the AI program pays the travel costs of the state tester, the State can do the NPIP testing for only a nominal cost. When the State does testing at an auction, they are only testing for Avian Influenza.

 

[Sooner]

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It's hard to tell exactly how big it is. I would say no to 30 standard size chickens I can't remember the per foot each bird should have. If you are building the coop outside of that structure then you would be able to have a few more than if it will be on the inside. As for the height, I like it, I have one that I have to stoop over & it stinks.

 

[Ivyblaze]

Coop will go outside on the east side....thinking of adding a hoop like extension onto the back and call it my chicken tunnel lol. They usually get to free range a bit too everyday while I am outside doing chores etc.