The Old Folks Home

[superchemicalgirl]

Found a lone, "surprise" chick in the yard near the coop this morning. Probably a couple of days old. Well, hellooo, chick, who's your mama?

Grace - the banty hen who had gotten off the Easter HAL eggs I gave her, was nearby, but not acting protective at all. Carl, my dominate roo, was keeping curious ducks and geese away from it, though. (He is THE best rooster!) I scooped up the little gal/guy, took it into the coop and placed it in the bucket nest with Buffy, (who is currently broody but I keep taking eggs from her). She pecked it, so I put it in with Angel, who has hatched and is raising two Easter HAL chicks.

She accepted it.

"Grafting" chicks to broody hens is an interesting process. This Easter is the first time I've tried it.

I had a similar issue today. My perpetually broody Banty hatched a turkey a couple days ago but left 3 eggs that were viable but a couple days behind. Long story short I found a turkey-sicle in one of the nest boxes today. Brought it inside and warmed it up, and just now brought it out to Banty who pecked at it a few times and then decided she could love it. This was after being rejected by other broodies, and the cats.

In just a few short days I'll be headed out to Utah. Poor BF, he'll be in charge of an entire wire rack of seedlings, plus some plants in the cold frame, chicks in the basement, Banty and her turklets, the actual adult chickens/turkeys, the ducks, the goats, a cat with a UTI needing twice daily antibiotics... not to mention his actual job.

I can't believe someone already has zucchini. I haven't even started my cucurbit seeds yet. We were only 34 degrees this morning.

 

[getaclue]

Confession of a Floridian: I was in my 50's the first time I ever saw, and drove in snow. It's hard to imagine such low temps in other parts of the country this time of year, when it's in the 80's here now. Many things are different due to the climate, such as planting time, harvest time, barn, and coop design to name a few. I can only imagine what goes through some of your minds when I talk about letting my chicks go outside, considering it's 50 degrees if you step outside your back door in the area where you live, and yet it is beach weather here. DH is from Indiana, and relies on childhood memories of gardening, and tending animals. More than once I've had to remind him it does NOT snow here. We don't have to wait for the ground to thaw, because it never freezes to begin with. He was upset with me when I wouldn't let him insulate the coop to protect my flock from the harsh cold. We don't have harsh cold. When he has difficulty with the concept of these things, and he lives here, I know it seems foreign to many of you. I read with interest about how you manage to keep the hoses from freezing, or what you use to keep the water buckets warm so they don't ice over, and your animals can enjoy water, or feeding them warm oatmeal in the morning to warm them up, but it's not what we experience here. When DH retires, he's considering moving us to Indiana. Keep posting things on how you cope with your winters, and I will enjoy reading it, and I may need all the information someday. If you ever move to Florida, or someplace warm, I can provide tips to you that will probably make more sense.

 

[ozexpat]

While I prefer not to use antbiotics, sometimes its a choice between devastation or cure

I prefer oxytetracycline to tylan.

Now putting it into perspective,. You give a chicken a chicken size dose of the drug. How much residue is left in the next 200 eggs it lays and 4kg of meat?

Do what you think is best.

 

[CanuckBock]

While I prefer not to use antbiotics, sometimes its a choice between devastation or cure

I prefer oxytetracycline to tylan.

Now putting it into perspective,. You give a chicken a chicken size dose of the drug. How much residue is left in the next 200 eggs it lays and 4kg of meat?

Do what you think is best.

Thank you for your input Oz. I appreciate this immensely.

I don't know what I think is best because I feel like I am getting incomplete information. I am getting very extreme advice and sure glad this is hypothetical and only a pondering about what might happen in the future, if bad things come to pass for us.

The eggs I posted from the friend were from hens treated with both Tylan and oxy they say in their quote I posted.

I get that it would be a small dose of the drug and the residue would diminish over time (reasons why we have & should adhere to "drug withdrawal" times). I also know a hen has the beginnings of every egg she will ever produce already in her when she goes into production...to me there are just as many reasons why to treat and not eat meat/eggs as to why you can eat what is produced even after treatment after the recommended withdrawal time period has passed. There is no clear right answer or wrong one for that matter. Grey maybe answers...

I can only go by what others tell me they have personally experienced since we don't have CRD and have never treated for it. The person that treated their hens and I posted the pics of the eggs had such violent reactions to the treated eggs they could not eat them any more. I am not saying that I would react in this way just repeating what they said happens.

I would be willing to raise up one whole generation and never eat their eggs or meat if it meant that an otherwise CRD infected line could be made clean and gone forward with. I mean, how do hatcheries do this then...many would have had to do something to ensure the day olds they sell don't spread far and wide and have CRD? I am going to have to dig deeper and ask around to a few hatcheries and see if I can dig up the goods on what they do to stop CRD in hatching eggs. Does a hatchery treat the hens with certain drugs and then sell the day olds to people...this would fly in the face of people that tell me Tylan makes the treated birds produce eggs and meat that makes people ill. I don't recall ever hearing anyone getting birds from a hatchery that produce products that made them ill...quite the contrary that we all rave about the good foods we get with our own chickens.

NO wonder I am confused...ha ha ha.

I have birds for their benefits which are many but some of the major plusses are the eggs and meat production. I abhor the thought that some disease can sweep in so easily and compromise their ability to produce such fine abundant good for us all products. I chose the chickens we raise because they all provide plenty of good eggs...to hatch and to eat.

I am trying to face one of my fears so I know how to attack it (be prepared) and not doing that too well. I get people telling me there is NO cure and you have to CULL as in kill them to stop CRD and then others say you can use drugs but not this such and such one and then I receive a copy of that article I posted the link to and gives me a simple procedure to do and supposedly all will be fine. I could embrace that article...it is so easy! Too dang easy is my suspicion.

I can only imagine if I did break our closed landfowl flock protocols and brought in some chickeny hatching eggs and did the big dip in Tylan, then to hatch them and then find coughing and sniffling chooks & turks everywhere. Really kinda way too late at that point I figure--who would I have to blame for that blunder but myself for believing and trusting a method that sounds too good to be true from a magazine I read!

Any of you recall the All in the Family episode where Edith finds a magazine on the subway and invites the swinger couple over because she figures they just want some friendship...

Archie Bunker to wife Edith:

Yeh...that would be moi with Rick being Archie!

I have a person in the province over from me that has confided in me to say they have CRD. They want to know what to do and past me telling them to ask a vet...I feel useless at being able to give them viable options. The undisputable one would be to say cull the flock...but then where does that person go for non-CRD birds. I don't have the breeds they want, so no help there...a hatchery would be an option but I was really keen about that magazine article being a fix all answer! That person could bring in hatching eggs of whatever kinds they wanted. They could treat the eggs knowing all would be safe from CRD (there would be other issues sure, but this would exclude them having to revisit CRD all over again). When someone is dedicated enough that they would kill a whole flock of birds they love because they "think" they are doing the right thing and are able to begin up with a CRD free flock--you have to be very careful what advice you give them. I think they have already been kicked down enough and they really need to be helped not hurt all over again.

Rick and I have had the talk...what if we had to cull all the birds due to a disease break out...would we have the heart to do it over again...get back into poultry AFTER the cleansing...

I know one thing for certain...GONE...all gone are many of the sources where we got the starts in birds. Retired, died--the bantam Brahmas alone have 65 to 75 years in their lines...traced straight back to John Kriner, Sr. (not Jr. but senior!) in a pure line with nothing else added. When we asked Murray to share some of his lines with us, he bred up 250 birds to send us 9...that's the top 3.6% of what he produced to send us some of what we told him, we wanted were HIS birds. He was old then...he is ancient now, doubt he could do that over again in a season. He was so tickled to help us he even put the run on a judge that wanted some of his birds that year...judge came calling three times and each time Murray told him, "Nope, no birds for sale until I pick out the Higginses birds!" Murray told us on the third visit the judge was beside himself and said, "Just how many are you sending them?" "Nine..." to which the judge just about spit! Murray chose out a cockerel that had what he called one of the best sets of clear wing bows he had produced and a Buff hen that was so ebony and dark buff the contrast was just glaring (not as vivid as a light buff but we prefer the darker richer buff). Murray sent us Murray's birds and we are so happy to have that as a start in the bantam Brahmas here. So who's ready with the hatchet to CULL those ones??

Here is some of Murray's line as day olds, compared to FOUR DAY olds from a hatchery...can you see the difference of what decades of an old time line means? Both are suppose to be bantam Dark Brahmas...from foot feathering to down markings...size and even basic colour. NO comparison! So please, how do you replace these if we were to get wiped out and have to cull any survivors for CRD?


1st photo; day old Murray chick on left, right 4 day old hatchery / 2nd photo; four day old hatchery on left, day old Murray on lower right.

​

On left, four 4-day old hatchery & on right are three 1-day old Murray bantam Dark Brahma chicks
​

So far we are clear of CRD and no chicken or turkey cold symptoms, full production here in meat and eggs, and no stress triggered illnesses. I like that and I don't want to trade a few new birds EVER to compromise the duty of care I owe the ones already established here. I don't think about adding any landfowl...always that nagging thought..."sure, do it this once and get zinged...sure!" So I don't even think about it but then I guess I get an answer I could believe in from some magazine on birds and it starts making me think about options.

I am fearful because of the unknown and that makes us unreasonable and unstable when we normally make really good educated decisions. The worst ones are the little bit here and there...the nibbles...never outright cut and dry answers...the sortas. HATE that! I am the kind that needs to know, don't have to be 100% accurate but when the choices you make affect those poultry we all so love to keep safe and happy, well I am not going to take anyone's word as complete golden gospel. I'd like to see some science backing up how one uses a drug to cleanse a line of chickens of CRD but it is a given that I can't trust even the drug companies to be open and truthful. They are in the biz to sell their drugs and I still laugh at the "encourages growth in food livestock" claims for Tylan. Sure it would...genetically compromised factory farm birds would never make it to market weight without some help from drugs in the conditions they are raised up in--that's me being cynical...must behave and stop that....bad bad bad!

Oz, may I inquire as to why you don't prefer Tylan and prefer Oxytetracycline? I believe I have a package of that very antibiotic in my animal med cupboard...easy to acquire, sits stable in a dark cool cupboard...I am told it works though never administered any to the poultry here. I think I am on my third package, since the ones prior have all expired...just my big stick in the little cupboard ready and armed should I need it. Bwa ha ha...

From what I am being told, the oxy will treat the symptoms of CRD but will not stop the disease from repeatedly coming back each time the bird experiences a stressful event and succumbs to the CRD pressures. So this oxy is sorta like the product VetRX (which I am told helps reduce chronic respiratory symptoms too...I got that in the med cabinet also...unopened but there and waiting...YAH! I have part of the arsenal already and did not know it! Whee...), the antibiotic oxy will treat symptoms and certainly make the birds more comfortable during an outbreak of symptoms but it does not CURE the bird...or stop the bird from getting the disease or being a carrier and infecting other birds. I am not sure at this point there is a CURE for CRD only that some still say Tylan or Denagard will stop the disease and stop the birds from spreading CRD.

I want to believe...

​

In a perfect world we would have all the answers and be able to use products that would annihilate any evil that could harm our precious poultry without any residual side affects to harm them or us...but we don't live in a perfect world.

Doggone & Chicken UP!

Tara Lee Higgins
Higgins Rat Ranch Conservation Farm, Alberta, Canada

 

[dsqard]

CanuckBock I think someone around here wants to believe too.


Yesterday I went out to find this place that had all the graffiti near where I live. I started off on the wrong foot at first but wound up with the shot below so I am not complaining too much.

 

[Pozees]

Tara, one system some of the old timers here on BYC advocate is having breeding partners in case of just such a devastation. Whether disease, predator, extreme weather event, etc., there is always the chance our flocks can be wiped out, and in your case, you have lines that may not be recoverable were such an event to occur. Bob Blosl advocated a distance of 500 miles between partners, as I recall (I am sure someone can correct me if I've remembered wrong, it happens frequently LOL). Fred's Hens has breeding partners further than that. Each was/is ensuring they had access to the lines they had worked so hard and lovingly to improve and continue.

I would take that article to your vet and ask where the fallacies lie. It is my understanding the method will work but may not be 100%, that the chicks have to be tested at 3 weeks of age, and that you don't cull the foundation flock until the tests on the offspring are clear. You can maintain the original flock in comfort and rebuild your flock. It would be a lot of work, but quite worthwhile in your case.

I understand your fear, things we cannot control despite our best efforts, that may swoop down on us at any time, with no warning, are terrifying. Such is life.

The thing I keep repeating to myself when I feel that hollow, cold fear, is something I read decades ago that has stuck with me since, and I can't even attribute it correctly: When a robin eats a worm, the worm doesn't think it's very fair; but that's life.

Let us know as you learn more, I am following with interest.

 

[threechickfarm]

Oh and I love the repurposed white table! That's perfect for chicken climbing.

They LOVE their table! Thanks

 

[chickisoup]

While I prefer not to use antbiotics, sometimes its a choice between devastation or cure

I prefer oxytetracycline to tylan.

Now putting it into perspective,. You give a chicken a chicken size dose of the drug. How much residue is left in the next 200 eggs it lays and 4kg of meat?

Do what you think is best.

Yep, for what it's worth, I agree on the oxytet. Had it recommended to me by a professional after using Duramycin that didn't work. Now Oxytetracycline is my always in my emergency kit go to antibiotic. I hate using drugs too, but like you said OZ............................

Love the baby pics CanuckBock!!!! got to get on taking new pics of mine. They will be a week old tomorrow already!!!

 

[Highcotton]

Confession of a Floridian: I was in my 50's the first time I ever saw, and drove in snow. It's hard to imagine such low temps in other parts of the country this time of year, when it's in the 80's here now. Many things are different due to the climate, such as planting time, harvest time, barn, and coop design to name a few. I can only imagine what goes through some of your minds when I talk about letting my chicks go outside, considering it's 50 degrees if you step outside your back door in the area where you live, and yet it is beach weather here. DH is from Indiana, and relies on childhood memories of gardening, and tending animals. More than once I've had to remind him it does NOT snow here. We don't have to wait for the ground to thaw, because it never freezes to begin with. He was upset with me when I wouldn't let him insulate the coop to protect my flock from the harsh cold. We don't have harsh cold. When he has difficulty with the concept of these things, and he lives here, I know it seems foreign to many of you. I read with interest about how you manage to keep the hoses from freezing, or what you use to keep the water buckets warm so they don't ice over, and your animals can enjoy water, or feeding them warm oatmeal in the morning to warm them up, but it's not what we experience here. When DH retires, he's considering moving us to Indiana. Keep posting things on how you cope with your winters, and I will enjoy reading it, and I may need all the information someday. If you ever move to Florida, or someplace warm, I can provide tips to you that will probably make more sense.

Yes, we have winter cool season gardens and summer gardens here in Georgia. A lot of people don't understand that concept. I don't have squash yet but I do have plenty of cool season vegetables. Carrots are planted here in September so they can mature in the cooler weather. Vidalia onions are planted by Christmas and harvested in May.

 

[getaclue]

oz, canuckbock, From what I gather, there is more than 1 type of CRD causing germ, and secondary infections are common too. My personal plan of attack would be to go with oxytetracycline. It's strong, and broad spectrum, but improvement may not show immediately. Most antibiotics don't stay in the system for extremey long periods of time, that's why they have to keep dosing. I am allergic to penicillin, so when I was a kid the choice of antibiotic boiled down to tetracycline, or terramycin. I would not use two antibiotics at the same time. That can do as much, or more harm than good. Apparently, the quicker you catch, and treat this the better the odds. The longer it is left untreated, the worse it gets, and the worse the secondary infections get. My second plan of attack would be to include showbird feed. That is like optimal nutrition for them. Dairy can be counterproductive with some of the older type antibiotics, so I would not give yogurt, or any other dairy product. I would also add some Gatorade to their water, but again, don't overdo it. Big changes can stress them too, which is counterproductive to getting well.