I am wondering the same thing... in those other countries they had to bring their poultry indoors... I cant really do that here unless I build something new. Their coop now is very open. I'm like you... I'm not sitting around worrying about it, but it could become a big deal soon. eeekk!

usda website below...

DOes anyone know what to look for to tell if your chickens have avian flu?

Here is a link that might be useful: USDA bird flu

My 20 chickens are in a large 'yard' about 1000 square feet or larger. Wild birds, especially sparrows, are routinely in there. I'm wondering if I should be trying to downsize my flock so that I could keep them in the barn. Of course this defeats the purpose of having 'free range' hens. I might as well just buy grocery store eggs at that point.

I probably wouldn't be able to tell one chicken illness from another. I've never had a sick chicken.

My daughter just started working at the chicken farm that is about 2 miles from our house, packing eggs. I hate to think how they feel about this! Must be scary at this time to be in that business! Of course all theirs are inside, but you never know. They are pretty strict about keeping things clean. They won't let you work in the chicken barns if you own poultry at home. I plan to get chickens this Spring, but since daughter only works in egg packing it should be okay. I will have a yard for my chickens so I'm sure birds will be able to get in the yard with them. I guess I'll worry about it when and if the time comes.
Karen

I posted a question to this forum back in Oct (bird flu)

http://forums2.gardenweb.com/forums/load/farmlife/msg101758126316.html

that has some pretty good response info about how to deal with handling poultry...it has a link to a page with information about protecting workers against avian flu...and also about keeping clean and cooking temps.

I'm not sure, but I think you would have to have a blood test given to the chickens to see if they have H5N1...which is the strain of avian flu we all hope does not become a pandemic. I also think that it spreads quickly, and the chickens would be dying pretty fast.

I have a small backyard flock of 15 that has free range during the day. I will be watching the chickens, and watching the news with the spring migration beginning. Now that the avian flu has spread to Europe, it is very possible it will enter the US (in my opinion).

Please read this news release:

Cornucopia Institute Opposes Virginia Poultry Proposal

Legislation Could Ban Small Scale/Humane Production

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Mark Kastel, 608-625-2042
Joel Salatin, 540-885-3590

The Cornucopia Institute has announced their support for family farmers in
their opposition to a legislative proposal in the state of Virginia that could
eliminate the ability of the states residents to raise chickens and other fowl
in the outdoors for eventual sale to consumers. The stated purpose of the
controversial legislation, HR 982, is to control live bird marketsÂof which there
are none in VirginiaÂbut the Institute believes that itÂs real purpose is to
stop independent poultry producers from raising their flocks outdoors because
federal officials are worried about an avian flu epidemic.

"This legislation is extremely troubling as consumers are increasingly hungry
for organic and sustainable eggs and poultry that come from healthy birds
raised outdoors," said Mark Kastel, Senior Farm Policy Analyst for The Cornucopia
Institute, a Wisconsin-based organic farming watchdog group. "The billÂs
language is too vague and would allow the stateÂs Agricultural Commissioner to
arbitrarily regulate and control small- to medium-sized poultry flocks, not just
live bird markets, which currently donÂt even exist in Virginia."

Passage of the legislation by Virginia would make the state eligible for
federal funding that could be used to hunt down outdoor poultry producers and lead
to the shutdown of their operations.

"Nothing would make the huge poultry confinement operators happier than to
squelch an increasingly popular competitor that consumers are flocking to,"
Kastel added. "Consumers have discovered that the purveyors of organic and
direct-market eggs and poultry raised in healthy, outdoor conditions offer a
superior-tasting product, and that scares the huge confinement operations."

Kastel noted that it was no coincidence that the bill was being pushed by the
Del-Mar-Va Poultry industry, a giant industrial poultry cooperative, and by
the stateÂs Agribusiness Council and the Farm Bureau. Organic and sustainable
farming advocates are concerned that this legislative initiative in Virginia is
just the first in a battle that will spread to statehouses around the nation.

Joel Salatin, a Virginia poultry farmer, is skeptical of the hype surrounding
avian flu and domestic outdoor bird operations. "This has been an issue in
Southeast Asia," said Salatin, "because of the extraordinarily unsanitary
conditions their fowl are raised in." Pointing to China, Salatin explains that
"because of theft, families typically confine 200 birds in an 8Â x 8Â cage with
no bedding provided. The birds are living on six to eight inches of raw fecal
build-up and locked in unhygienic squalor."

These conditions in foreign lands stand in marked contrast to the way organic
and sustainable growers raise poultry in the United States. Salatin calls his
birds "pastured poultry" because his thousands of chickens and turkeys are
moved on a daily basis to fresh pasture paddocks and allowed to exhibit their
natural, instinctive behaviors. Salatin, who has raised poultry for 50 years,
strongly criticizes regulators and health experts for failing to grasp this
different agricultural style: "NobodyÂnot the World Health Organization, the
European Union, or the USDAÂhas been willing to articulate the difference between
clean outdoor housing and unhygienic outdoor housing."

"Virginians should reject this ill-framed poultry proposal and allow its
consumers and citizens freedom of choice in the food they want," Salatin added.

If federal experts are truly concerned about an avian flu outbreak in poultry
flocks, Kastel suggests they look elsewhere. "Historically," Kastel
observed, "Avian flu outbreaks have been concentrated in large, confinement,
industrial-scale poultry facilities, where management is theoretically practicing
stringent bio-security measures."

Even before the latest flu scare, poultry industry lobbyists were advocating
the change of organic poultry standards at the National Organic Standards
Board by seeking removal of the federal requirement that organic birds have access
to the outdoors. "Trade lobbyists were trying to gut federal law so that
their clients can use their confinement practices," noted Kastel. "Should the
Virginia proposal pass, we think these same powerful forces will use it as a
model for other states and try to achieve through the backdoorÂand under cover of
the avian flu scareÂwhat theyÂve been unable to get from the National Organic
Standards Board."

Consumers and farmers interested in more information on this issue, and
contact information for sending messages to the Virginia legislature, can visit
CornucopiaÂs Web page at www.cornucopia.org.

 30 Â

Individuals interested in more information or who want to take contact
elected officials with their thoughts may click on this link to the Virginia
Independent Consumers and Farmers Association at http://www.vicfa.net/action.html

________________________________________________________________________

This whole bird flu thing was started by the beef growers to get us to stop eating chicken and eat more beef. JUST KIDDING. It seems that everywhere this flu has been is from places that are filthy and the birds live with the people in their houses. I know that we can not stop it but I feel that if we take care of our animals and keep them clean and healthy, that we will be ok.

I agree with woco. In almost every instance that I've heard of, the disease seems to originate from birds that are forced to live in filthy conditions, with humans in close proximity. And I have to admit when I first started keeping chickens, I reached apoint when I didn't consider their droppings to be dirty (per se) any longer. The smell isn't bad to me either. But I keep it cleaned out because I know it can cause the chickens to become ill and harbors germs.

We have a small home flock that we keep in a large pen (7000'sq) and I try to keep not only the coop very clean by sweeping out droppings daily, but also the grassy areas raked and watered. So far the only thing my chickens have died of is old age and I'm going to do my best to keep it that way.

I would hate to have to net (that'd be one big honkin' net) that pen to keep infected wild birds out, but I would if that's what it would take to stop this disease from infecting my chickens. Seamommy

A net would be difficult and expensive but it may not be enough. We may be required to have a solid roof over the yard to eliminate potential contact with feces of wild birds. Anyone know if rules have been drafted regarding this?

David

We are so easily conditioned (brainwashed) by what we see on the evening news. People think bird flu is the by product of independent poultry owners, back yard hobbyists, and let's not forget poor people in some thrid world country who keep a few hens running around outside their front door to help feed themselves. WRONG.

New from GRAIN
26 February 2006

GRAIN report says global poultry industry is the root of the bird flu crisis

Click here for further information / the full report.

GRAIN PRESS RELEASE Embargoed until 27 February 2006 (00:01 GMT) Contact: Devlin Kuyek (Montreal) +1 514 2737314

REPORT SAYS GLOBAL POULTRY INDUSTRY IS THE ROOT OF THE BIRD FLU CRISIS

Small-scale poultry farming and wild birds are being unfairly blamed for the bird flu crisis now affecting large parts of the world. A new report from GRAIN shows how the transnational poultry industry is the root of the problem and must be the focus of efforts to control the virus. [1]

The spread of industrial poultry production and trade networks has created ideal conditions for the emergence and transmission of lethal viruses like the H5N1 strain of bird flu. Once inside densely populated factory farms, viruses can rapidly become lethal and amplify. Air thick with viral load from infected farms is carried for kilometres, while integrated trade networks spread the disease through many carriers: live birds, day-old-chicks, meat, feathers, hatching eggs, eggs, chicken manure and animal feed. [2]

"Everyone is focused on migratory birds and backyard chickens as the problem," says Devlin Kuyek of GRAIN. "But they are not effective vectors of highly pathogenic bird flu. The virus kills them, but is unlikely to be spread by them."

For example, in Malaysia, the mortality rate from H5N1 among village chicken is only 5%, indicating that the virus has a hard time spreading among small scale chicken flocks. H5N1 outbreaks in Laos, which is surrounded by infected countries, have only occurred in the nation's few factory farms, which are supplied by Thai hatcheries. The only cases of bird flu in backyard poultry, which account for over 90% of Laos' production, occurred next to the factory farms.

"The evidence we see over and over again, from the Netherlands in 2003 to Japan in 2004 to Egypt in 2006, is that lethal bird flu breaks out in large scale industrial chicken farms and then spreads," Kuyek explains.

The Nigerian outbreak earlier this year began at a single factory farm, owned by a Cabinet minister, distant from hotspots for migratory birds but known for importing unregulated hatchable eggs. In India, local authorities say that H5N1 emerged and spread from a factory farm owned by the country's largest poultry company, Venkateshwara Hatcheries.

A burning question is why governments and international agencies, like the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation, are doing nothing to investigate how the factory farms and their byproducts, such as animal feed and manure, spread the virus. Instead, they are using the crisis as an opportunity to further industrialise the poultry sector. Initiatives are multiplying to ban outdoor poultry, squeeze out small producers and restock farms with genetically-modified chickens. The web of complicity with an industry engaged in a string of denials and cover-ups seems complete.

"Farmers are losing their livelihoods, native chickens are being wiped out and some experts say that we're on the verge of a human pandemic that could kill millions of people," Kuyek concludes. "When will governments realise that to protect poultry and people from bird flu, we need to protect them from the global poultry industry?"

[1] The full briefing, "Fowl play: The poultry industry's central role in the bird flu crisis", is available at
http://www.grain.org/go/birdflu.
Spanish and French translations will be posted shortly.

[2] Chicken faeces and bedding from poultry factory floors are common ingredients in animal feed.

+++++++++++++++

GRAIN is an international non-governmental organisation (NGO) which promotes the sustainable management and use of agricultural biodiversity based on people's control over genetic resources and local knowledge.

Contact: Devlin Kuyek, GRAIN, in Montreal Tel: +1 514 2737314 Email: devlin (at) grain.org Website:
http://www.grain.org

ENDS

I'm with you folks. I'm not terribly worried about chirpies either. Of course I don't worry about a lot anyways =)

Tim

Its scarey isnt it.I breed swans to sell every year I may think twice this year.

I have 12 hens in my backyard, and am worried about them. When I read about the Bird Flu in Europe, it says they are vaccinating poultry for it. But, when I ask at my feed store, they say there is no vaccine to prevent it. Anyone know if that is true?

Sadly, while there is no cure for Bird Flu, it CAN be treated:

{{gwi:36973}}
Oh, my aching giblets--!
Velvet ;)

LoL Velvet good one!

Netherlands to vaccinate free-range and hobby poultry:
CNN article

More on vaccination in Europe:
Medical news

US has poultry vaccine stockpiled (last sentence in article):
article

I guess I don't understand. If there is a vaccine that we can treat our poultry with, why don't we do it? I understand that the eggs cannot be used for a few weeks. But, I don't want my 12 hens to get sick, or to be seized by the county when the flu arrives.

There is an article (Guarding the Henhouse) in the March 20th issue of Time where they say, "Putting Down a flock of 50,000 infected chickens is easier than vaccinating 10 billion healthy ones." This article is only talking about factory farms though. I'm sure the government could care less about the flocks of small farms an hobbiests. Might as well kill 'em then they can go back to buying Perdue.

Tim

My mom and I both have small flocks and my mom keeps teasing me that they are going to come and take our chickens away if things get worse. She said we'll have to hide them. That won't be easy for me, since I live in a MOBILE HOME with no basement or attic. lol. And there isn't much room under our bed with all of the other crap that is there. Plus....how to keep them quiet??! ;^p

Anyhow, my gals and guy are not free-range. They are in a little barn with attached pen and roof over the pen. But like toomanypotatoes, I've gone out to my coop to see Sparrows IN with the chickens, happily enjoying the scratch buffet. The wire on our pen has kinda big openings. So I got some kind of netting stuff and put it over the whole pen---need to fix parts of it in fact. It stinks when I'm back there and want to fling a bit of grass in---used to be able to stick my fingers right in through the wire, but I hate to have anything bad happen.

I was going to order more chicks this year, to supplement my tiny backyard flock, but decided not to because of the bird flu panic. I'm afraid the government will want to kill them all in a year.

Lowe's is not going to carry chicken manure this year... Home depot didn't have any yesterday.

Anyone know what to use besides?

If you don't know about it already, you all should know because it will affect you: The USDA is using avian flu as justification for a system that require you all to register your farm/home and every one of your livestock animals, have them microchipped, and report every movement of them off your property, with fees for non-reporting. Sounds too Big Brother to be true, but it is. Find out more at http://animalid.aphis.usda.gov/nais/index.shtml
and http://nonais.org/
While being able to track our food back to the source in the event of an outbreak is great, the NAIS goes way overboard and will drive many small farmers out of business/make having a backyard flock impossible.

I saw this article yesterday on the Birmingham News website. It talks about a recent case of mad cow found in Alabama, and an NAIS bill coming up in AL.

Regular flu kills about 30,000 people each season. This new bird flu has killed under 200 people in 10 years. Media and the USDA are blowing out of proportion.

I was thinking about having an outdoor avairy built in my yard for my exotic birds and finches. I have a conjure, McCaw, 3 cockatiels and half dozen finches. They now live in their own cages in a "bird room" of the house, but I thought they would enjoy it and be healthier for it if they could live outside during the summer months. Now I'm worried that a passing wild bird searching for a free meal would inadvertently kill my little friends. Maybe keeping them in the bird room is the safest bet. But then again, I wouldn't want to over-react at the expense of my bird's happiness.

*cough cough* sorry that was my sars acting up again. Got another article about chirpies for ya'll.

Flock-Killing Planned if Bird Flu Found

Tim

A quote from the link lyam posted "Most of America's chickens come from big commercial farms that keep birds indoors and are well-protected against the spread of disease." ARRRGGGH do they not get it? It's BECAUSE they cram thousands of birds into buildings that they are so susceptible to disease. This whole media circus is just absurd.

I have a dumb question - how is a sick bird that is infected with a disease like avian influenza going to make the trip across the Pacific (or Atlantic, for that matter)? Those of us who have seen chickens with the more generic form of avian flu know that they are pretty weak - I can't imagine a sick tweety bird would fly very far before it simply falls out of the sky...

-Diggity

Most normal Flues are bird flus that come from Asia, they may mutate slightly in the US but they all do the majority of there changing in birds and hop the species barrior over in asia then come here. You know what deaseas kills most of the people exposed to bird flu, salmonella! nTreat your flock like you would a sick person down aat the office and you should be fine, just don't let youy kids go and play with the birds.

We Identified H5 in the 50's and in mutated to H5N1 in the late 90's, its had ten years of migrations to cross the pacific but it has failed to, so why are we so worried that it will this year? MEdia Hype, I've heard lots of people say "its not if but when" the truth is its still if, Unfortunately when bird get sick they don't show many symptoms except death, So if your chickens all die heres a hint, don't hold a funeral! Beyond that theres not much we can do, because we are about tenthousand times more likely to catch H5N1 from some guy down at the office than we are to catch it from birds that we don't share a keyboard or phone with.

Oh, and don't assume that because the CDC says something its true, I was listening to the Radio last night and I heard about the hog flu epidemic some years back, the Army was tracking it for research purposes and the CDC found out, issued a press conference about it, 60,000 people got vaccinated in the next few weeks, a good number of them had adverse side effects from the vacine, One person died from the actuall thing, one.