Questions on West Nile virus..

[Kathy1]

They have just found it in mosquitos in my neighboring towns, Wondering how this will effect my chick's and what to do to help prevent them being bitten. What happens in they eat one??

 

[hinkjc]

There is lots of good information on the CDC site about WNV and chickens. Here is a link to a search I just ran..

http://www.cdc.gov/search.do?queryT...ion=search&searchButton.x=30&searchButton.y=8

If you are concerned about your chickens getting WNV or if it is in your area, you can call a local university to have the mosquito population tested.

Jody

 

[chickiebaby]

Kathy1, where in Mass are you? Must have missed this exciting news.

 

[Kathy1]

They have found it in Taunton, Whitman, Raynham, West Roxbury, Malden, Watertown, and in birds in Whitman , Needham, Dedham, Sudbury and Haverhill. I am in Brockton Which is Between the Bridgewaters, Taunton and Whitman, I live inthe middle on no where surrounded my water, geese and ducks etc. So I am concernd.

I think that if they eat one they would be ok, as their digestive juices would kill any virus. Am I wrong, I have no standing water in my yard but am surrounded by large bodies of water. I looked up the link above, thank you for it, I didnt understand much of it though LOL I do know that they have tested here the lst few years and it has shown nothing. Is there a vaccination I can get for my girls? Sorry to be so uninformed but I am new to this, and wont know till I ask

 

[lauralou]

Kathy1,

I followed the link above, as you did, and of course, scientific articles are difficult for the layperson to understand. I found the third article, entitled "Experimental Infection of Chickens as Candidate Sentinels for West Nile Virus" to be very interesting. If you read only the abstract, (the paragraph preceding the actual article) it will be easier to understand.

What I gathered from the article was that chickens are not in much danger from West Nile Virus. Great news! I had wondered about that myself.

It said that none of the chickens in the experiment that were infected with the virus actually developed the disease. Instead, they made antibodies and fought the virus off.

That's what I got out of it, anyway.

Thanks, Jody, for posting that link!

 

[Kathy1]

Thanks for that I was peeking at work shhhhh lol and was not focusing on the info at work or here LOL, It seems they will be safe then. I will re read that again. It makes me feel better. Great to kn ow they will resist it, Odd that other fowl do not.