To Vaccinate or not to vaccinate? That is the Question!

[TysonDSMIowa]

To Vaccinate or not to vaccinate? That is the Question! Where do you stand on having your baby chicks vaccinated?

 

[KatharinetheGr8]

My family vaccinates. I figure they can use all the help they can get. It is no guarantee that the worst still won't happen, but it is a small price to pay to get a small leg up on all the things that can go wrong.

 

[oldhenlikesdogs]

Never vaccinated never will, I prefer for chickens to develop their own immunity to what is a problem here, I am willing to cull if someone can't fight off an illness, I don't see too many diseases, build a strong flock, keep a strong flock.

 

[Gossie]

We usually vaccinate our chicks, although once we ordered 7 vaccinated chicks and 6 died of what we believe was marek's. So I'm not really sure vaccinating worked in our case.

 

[Folly's place]

I'm happy to have chicks vaccinated for Marek's disease when I order them, but chicks hatched here aren't vaccinated. They act as sentinals for the flock; so far no Marek's disease here. I don't show birds, and haven't vaccinated for anything else. Mary

 

[KatharinetheGr8]

I wanted to know more about Marek's Disease so I did a quick Google Search and found this publication from The University of New Hampshire Cooperative Extension regarding the disease and the effects on a flock from vaccinations. The numbers are pretty hard to argue with, so I will continue to vaccinate my chicks. Hope this helps your decision.

 

[gregstickels]

To Vaccinate or not to vaccinate? That is the Question! Where do you stand on having your baby chicks vaccinated?

I watched a video that had a vet talking about the vaccine for Marek's disease. He stated that this vaccine does not prevent infection, but that it eliminates symptoms, much like the pertussis (whooping cough) vaccine in humans. Therefore, the vaccinated chicken can have asymptomatic infection and spread the infection to your entire flock. You would never know that the vaccinated was ever infected. Blood tests from the other chickens could show that the virus came from the vaccine strain.

 

[Folly's place]

The Marek's disease vaccine does NOT cause the disease in chickens! If the flock is infected, the vaccinated birds are less likely to die of the tumors that infected birds develop. If there's no Marek's disease in the flock, adding vaccinated and UNEXPOSED birds won't bring the disease in.
Adding any outside birds, except safe new chicks, is a risk for this disease to appear. That's why it's important to practice good biosecurity and be lucky. If the disease appears, then other decisions have to be made.
Mary

 

[Ghosty]

I watched a video that had a vet talking about the vaccine for Marek's disease. He stated that this vaccine does not prevent infection, but that it eliminates symptoms, much like the pertussis (whooping cough) vaccine in humans. Therefore, the vaccinated chicken can have asymptomatic infection and spread the infection to your entire flock. You would never know that the vaccinated was ever infected. Blood tests from the other chickens could show that the virus came from the vaccine strain.

The vaccine does not spread Marek's.

The most widely used Marek's vaccine is the herpesvirus of turkeys (HVT), which is non-pathogenic in chickens and therefore safe, but also closely enough related to the MD virus (serotype 3) to stimulate an immune response.

There is a lot of misinformation out there. Get yours from reputable sources. There are many university extension pdfs that are easily googled.
I will vaccinate whenever possible.

 

[ErnieBerley]

oh my...well i just started raising chickens in May of 2019 (and i do love them !!) and i've already gotten 5 birds off craigslist that carried the Marek's virus. ....they all died the same way, paralysis followed by a slow death and i had to euthanize most of them - 4 white silkie babies that were so cute and 1 Ayam cemani rooster that was amazing, handsome and proud. If you're gonna experiment with purchasing chickens from people off craigslist and local farmers you better vaccinate or you may bring in something into your flock you definitely do not want. !