Vaccinated chicks / Medicated food?

[Rafter 7 Paint Horses]

My opinion on the medicated feed.

Med. feed is intended to give your chicks a chance to build their own immunity to coccidiosis, it does not give them immunity from it.
It has a small amount of coccidiostat.

The protozoan parasites can lay dormant in the ground for years & I believe it is everywhere.
Housing chickens just elevates the chance of coccidiosis compared to free ranging. Since we alter their natural way of avoiding parasites, we need to give them medicated feed to help them build immunity.

This is just my opinion, I know others disagree & that is OK.
I just want you to have different opinions so you can make your own choice.

Jean

 

[Cheryl]

So I have never had chickens, would I then not have to worry about coccidiosis? Make sure there is fresh water, uncontaminated food and everything is clean...

 

[Rafter 7 Paint Horses]

Here is a link that might explain it better.

http://www.dpi.qld.gov.au/cps/rde/xchg/dpi/hs.xsl/27_2736_ENA_HTML.htm

A few excerpts from the article:
Coccidiosis in chickens is caused by seven different species of coccidia (genus Eimeria), which are single celled parasites that live in the gut wall of their host. These coccidia are host specific: turkeys and other species are not infected by fowl coccidia and vice-versa. The different species of coccidia live in different parts of the gut and can be divided into those causing intestinal coccidiosis (the majority) or caecal coccidiosis (one species).

Coccidiosis is spread when one bird eats faecal material from an infected bird, which contains the infective stage of the coccidia (small egg-like bodies called oocysts). The oocysts in the droppings need moisture and warmth to mature before they can infect other birds, but in the right conditions, can do so very quickly (24 hr). Oocysts can remain alive in poultry sheds for more than a year and they are very resistant to most disinfectants.

It is very risky to rely on hygiene alone to produce satisfactory control.

Hope this helps you.
Jean

 

[greyfields]

Yes, the life cycle of the oocysts is incredibly long. Blanket and disc harrowing the field doesn't help destroy them either, since they are very UV resistant.

I had initially bought into the organic mind set for chickens. I truly believed if I moved my chickens all the time, kept them on fresh ground, kept their water clean, kept their pens clean, then I'd never have problems with Coccidiossis. I then thought I'd try diamatecous earth, then garlic, then all forms of herbals. Finally, my Extension agent had a professor from the University call me. It went something like this:

1) You have cocccidiossis where you live. The ground is very wet. There are no cold snaps or heat waves that will kill the occysts like in other areas. If you lived anywhere else with colder winters or warmer summers, we wouldn't be having this conversation. Where you live, you're naive to think rotation will work.

2) You can either medicate your feed, or you must accept losses in your poultry. The more losses you endure, the stronger your breeding stock will be in the future. It's painful, but it's an investment in your overall flock vigor.

So, I've chose to not treat for Coccidiosis, either by a Coccidiostat or Allupurinol (in their water). Yes, chickens have died. Some I'd even put a lot of feed into, but never got to eat them. However, with each generation, things get better. Eventually, my chickens will be coccidiosis resistant through breeding; and I think that is moral compared with artifically keeping birds alive who would not survive in nature by using medicated feeds.

Which is my opinion.

But a good one.

 

[imzadi]

OH NO!! WHAT NOW!!!

I purchased chickies...5 that ARE vaccinated against Cocciodies and two not. I didn't realize there was an issue and have alread, for a week now, been feeding them medicated food! AND...they are out of food so I just opened the new BIG back of chick food...hubby checking right now if it is medicated...probably, though!

WHAT DO I DO!!!! I didn't know this...HELP

 

[imzadi]

bump...any ideas?

Have I HURT MY BABIES? Or...is it simply a matter of the vaccine is no good...So I have to treat the babies as if they were never vaccinated...therefore, needing to continue the medicated food?

 

[Ridgerunner]

The medicated feed could, possibly, might, has been known to sometimes negate the vaccine. You have not hurt them; you may have, possibly, maybe made the money spent on vaccine worthless.

Last time I checked, the vaccine did not protect against all seven varieties of Cocci. Even if they were vaccinated they still could have problems from some varieties. So you could never assume they would never ever at any time have a problem with Cocci. Immunity to one variety does not give immunity to all varieties.

You’ll notice in what Greyfields wrote, the ground is very wet. That is the problem much more than Cocci being present. The cysts thrive in wet manure and live in wet soil. Warm weather plays a part too.

The problem with Cocci comes when the numbers get out of hand. Some living in their system does not hurt them, just enables them to develop immunity. Some varieties are stronger and more dangerous that others but what usually causes the problem is that they eat enough cysts from the wet ground to add to the number in their gut so the numbers get out of hand.

This does not always work because some varieties are stronger than others, but for most of us, if you can keep the brooders, coops, and runs dry, Cocci will never be a problem. In wet climates, that is next to impossible if your run is of any size. So they need to build up their immunity.

The dosage in Amprolium will not prevent Cocci or wipe it out. It reduces the reproduction of the Cocci so the numbers are less likely to get out of hand. If you have a wet brooder, coop, or run, they can still have a problem even on medicated feed. The medicated feed makes it a whole lot less likely that they will have a problem.

The medicated feed is not an antibiotic. It will not mess up any probiotics they have in their system and it will not affect anything except Cocci. It will not hurt them. It won’t do any good if the Cocci is not present, but it will not harm them.

Your danger time from Cocci is when they are first introduced to it. What sometimes happens is that people feed medicated feed while the chicks are in the brooder and stop it when they first hit the ground and are first exposed to Cocci. Those chicks can get sick, especially if the ground is wet. If you choose the feed medicated feed, you need to feed it for about three weeks after they have been introduced to Cocci. It takes 2 to 3 weeks for them to develop the immunity they need.

Personally I take dirt from my run and feed that to the chicks about the second or third day they are in the brooder. To me, this does three things. It gets grit in their system. It gets any probiotics the adults have into their systems. And it introduces anything that might cause a problem to them while they are in the brooder and can develop immunity. I can control the conditions in the brooder much better than the run when they hit the ground and I can observe them better. I do not feed medicated feed and I have never had a problem from Cocci. I don’t have the warm wet weather the people on the Gulf Coast have, but I do have plenty of periods with warm wet weather where Cocci can thrive.