Avian flu: When/if to freak out?

I lost two birds in a week. They just died. No weight loss or funny behavior except not roosting. I buried them, but if another one goes, I plan to take her to the state poultry lab for a necropsy. How fast does it go through your flock, if that’s even what it was?

Another market vendor suggested I go ahead and call the avian flu hotline, but I’m kind of afraid they’ll just take my whole flock.

Is there anything besides ACV that’s good for boosting their immunity?

Most countries have a scorched earth policy.  Kill all the birds on the property (and sometimes neighboring ones). Often a quarantine of not moving products off the farm for weeks or months (and sometimes neighbouring ones). And other things that can cause a lot of stress and financial loss, so it's not a decision to take lightly.

It's about international trade more than any actual stopping bird flu.

Where I live, just about any flock not 100% indoors with sanitizing workers upon entrey will test positive to bird flu. Even without mortality or symptoms. And even the indoor flocks test positive.   It's so much in the wild bird population here, that it's just a thing.  Depending on the variety the death rate can be between 0 to 90%.

If there are obvious symptoms of bird flu, yes, start the procedure.

But if it's just death, then maybe spend a few days eliminating the usual suspects. There are a lot more things that kill birds than the flu

Diet needs change as the weather changes.  Try some baked liver for a few days and extra oysters shells.

What did the dead birds smell like?  Sour crop, infection, injury, some nutritional deficiency, egg bound, all show up with smell.  What about the alive birds.  Do they have not normal smells?

Bumblefoot and other issues could explain not roosting.  Parasites on the roosts is another one.

And depression.   If they were best friends, the second one might just be sad and that is deadly.

....

My suggestion

Give the hens some extra treats and a deep clean of their house.  Observe them closely (a health check twice a day if possible) and see if they improve in the next week or so.

Any more deaths that you feel might be bird flu, don't burry them as some problems can get in the soil.  Freeze with date and time found dead in case you do want to send them off for testing.  A big note saying NOT FOOD also helps.  If not testing, dispose of the bodies in the local waste management or hazmat system (depending on what your local requirements are) if there is any chance of a communicable illness.

My suggestion would be to contact the local vet/health dept and have the chickens tested.

It would be sad if this problem became a something county wide.

If you have cold/flu symptoms contact you local health care provider.

I wouldn't involve the authorities because I want to breed the survivors. The authorities have a different set of priorities.

r ranson wrote:  Parasites on the roosts is another one.

Twice I have been visiting and had the chicken herder complain about birds not roosting/not going to bed, and both times they had a major mite/lice problem.

There are different types of mites, and some of them are deadly (blood mites is what my friend calls one of the deadlier variety.)

So I will back up Ms Ranson's suggestion of a thorough clean up as step 1. I use a veggie oil with a few drops of Tea Tree oil added to it to thoroughly oil the perches. My understanding is that this will smother the mites. Some humans are very sensitive to the odour of Tea Tree oil, but I'm only using 5 drops in about 1 1/2 cups of oil. I agree that too much of anything smelly could hurt delicate chicken lungs, but that's enough mix to do more than two 10 ft perches, and I haven't seen any ill effects beyond the perches being a bit slippery for a couple of days!

Are your birds using their nest boxes? That's the next place to check thoroughly. This is the one place where I prophylactically use Diatomaceous Earth. It too, isn't good for lungs, but I would thoroughly clean the nest boxes, sun solarize them (assuming that big ball in the sky isn't being obliterated by heavy clouds as it is in my neighborhood at the moment) then I sprinkle the DE amongst the nest material.  DE like many things, can kill good guys as  well as bad guys. Just because it's on the "organic" list, doesn't mean that I think it should be over used, but on my farm, a little in the next boxes seem to be a good help.

Our Gov't website lists the following as symptoms, and sudden death is on the list as the last item:

Infected birds may show 1or many of these signs:

lack of energy, movement or appetite
decreased egg production
swelling around the head, neck and eyes
coughing, gasping for air or sneezing
nervous signs, tremors or lack of coordination
diarrhea
sudden death

 Gov't of Canada: protect your flock

Emily, you haven't mentioned an approximate age for the girls that died?  We have found that sudden deaths have tended to happen in either quite young birds, or older geriatric birds. Our geriatric deaths often have shown signs of heart failure, but that's a bit subtle. Taking some good pictures if it happens again would be helpful.

Thanks, everyone, for the responses!  I'll try to address key points below.

Christopher Weeks wrote:I wouldn't involve the authorities because I want to breed the survivors. The authorities have a different set of priorities.

This is my fear, though I haven't graduated to breeding my birds, so I don't know if it matters if it is Avian Flu and I have survivors.
I don't want to cause an issue or spread a disease, but I also don't want to take unnecessarily drastic measures. I'm not opposed to drastic measures if they're completely necessary. But that's what I can't figure out. I'm afraid to even call the state hotline to ask questions.  I will add that last month, there was a confirmed case in a backyard flock two counties over.

I can certainly clean, but I have a 625 sq.ft. mulched run and use the deep litter method in my hoop coop.  I'm not sure how to clean that apart from taking the bedding down to dirt and putting in fresh shavings, and then cleaning the roosting bars and nest boxes. I do have DE. The run is covered, for whatever it's worth.



The two that died were 2-5 years old. One was definitely 2. The other could have been 2 or 5; I have the same breed from a 2020 flock and a 2023 flock.  
I have another one that's acting sick. Not roosting, not vying for food, losing weight, and today falling side ways. We separated her, and she'll eat on her own. I gave her scrambled eggs.  I haven't checked her for bumblefoot yet, but I didn't think that affected their eating habits. Give the symptoms listed below, it's not sounding good.

I have only processed one bird about 8 years ago, and not for a necropsy. So advice there would be helpful. Otherwise, the closest state poultry lab is 90 minutes away from me and not open on the weekends.

The nearest town would have a health department or the county would have a health department.

If they cant do the test they would probably pay the shipping charges.

If you do decide to do a cleaning/changing of bedding please wear a mask and gloves.

My mother had histoplamosis and was told she probably got it from cleaning a chicken house.  And bird flu might be much worse.

If they have more bird flue symptoms, please do start the process.  

Please understand that this will probably mean the death of all your birds and quarantine - and possibly the same for your neighbours.  It's an extremely sad thing and I don't know anyone who's recovered from the emotional impact of it.  

I have yet to see evidence that culling small poultry flocks prevents or slows the spread of bird flu.  Most likely, they caught it from the wild birds.  As chickens don't tend to migrate, they aren't a significant vector.  Although they can be an incubator if they have poor living conditions (several thousand living in one building with barely adequate air flow and lighting and never seeing the sun, is an excellent incubation for illness).

Following the ostrich thing in Canada, the authorities toss "science said" at us constantly, but unlike most other branches of government, they don't cite their sources.  When pushed, they say "international trade said science said and since we sell chicken and eggs overseas, we gotta scorch the earth and kill 'em all if there is even a whisper of bird flu" (I paraphrase with bias).

They have also been saying very loudly last week that even 10 months after the outbreak is over and the birds are healthy, they will still test positive for bird flu.  Again, they don't cite their sources on this.  

So I don't feel guilty taking the time to exclude other possibilities before reporting it.  I really don't want to kill all my birds.

But I also keep a closed flock, so none of my birds leave the property alive or dead (unless hazmat disposal) until there is a solution for this bird flu thing.  


Anne brings up a good reminder to be careful when cleaning the hen house.  ALWAYS!  There are a lot of things in a healthy henhouse that can damage humans.  But thankfully, the stuff that keeps us safe from them will also keep us safe from the flu (protective clothing, especially our breathing, air FLOW - from one side to the other, imidate cleaning of clothing, tools and self after finishing...etc.)

Emily wrote:

I have another one that's acting sick. Not roosting, not vying for food, losing weight, and today falling side ways.

Have you researched Marek's disease? https://vetmedbiosci.colostate.edu/vdl/colorado-avian-health-program/mareks-disease/

Your bird is a bit old for it, but I also have found that it can present in a bunch of different ways.

There are a bunch of diseases chickens can get other than Avian flu. But chickens don't talk, so it can be very hard to figure out which one it might be.

So I changed the bedding, cleaned the nest boxes and roosting bars, oiled the roosting bars, cleaned the feed pans.

I used the PoultryDVM symptom checker, and avian flu didn’t come back as even a low possibility.  

The most recently sick hen died, and I took her to the state poultry lab today.  So I’m just waiting now.

I will say she, like the one right before her, died in a possible Marek’s pose.

Emily Smith wrote:The most recently sick hen died, and I took her to the state poultry lab today.  So I’m just waiting now.

My fingers are crossed that you figure out what the problem is and are able to help keep your remaining birds healthy.

We can only do what we can do, and it sounds like you've done that, so I also hope you don't let this discourage you.

The birds sound too old for it to be a coccidiosis problem unless they somehow got a sudden heavy exposure? Another remote possibility is some other poisoning. I know that galvanization contains lead as an example.

Jay Angler wrote:

Emily Smith wrote:The most recently sick hen died, and I took her to the state poultry lab today.  So I’m just waiting now.

My fingers are crossed that you figure out what the problem is and are able to help keep your remaining birds healthy.

We can only do what we can do, and it sounds like you've done that, so I also hope you don't let this discourage you.

The birds sound too old for it to be a coccidiosis problem unless they somehow got a sudden heavy exposure? Another remote possibility is some other poisoning. I know that galvanization contains lead as an example.

Thanks! I'm hoping so too.


One thing that popped up was algae poisoning. We use plastic 5-gallon waterers, so no lead, but I don't clean them as regularly as I should, and algae does build up.

Another forum always says my coop is too small, so maybe over crowding is weakening them?  But it's just a roosting and laying spot, and there's plenty of space in between birds when they roost at night. Especially now. I spaced the bars out horizontally a bit more after cleaning, too.  Coop is 80 sqft. Run is 625 sqft for 32 birds originally, now down to 27 for 705 total daytime sqft.  I've always read 10 sqft minimum per bird for wandering, scratching, etc.

Update: It's not Avian Flu.

It says final diagnosis: hepatitis (bacterial: acineto. baumanii) with a ruptured gall bladder.
AI RRT-PCR was negative.
MG PCR was negative.
MS PRCR was positive.

So now I need to research that and see what I can do to help the rest of the flock.

So glad they won't be culled.

hepatitis sucks.  We haven't had this yet in our flock, so I'm not sure what to do for it.

Thank you for sharing your story. It is important to think these matters through and not rush to conclusions. Sorry about the hepatitis in your birds. These birds are such a blessing. I dont like to lose even one.