Learning As I Strive to Raise Healthy Chickens

Where has this year gone?!? It has been over a year now that we have moved onto our farm/homestead and during that time I increased my flock of chickens 10 times over. When we made the move I had eight and now I have over 80 chickens with more on the way. And the consequence of an ever-increasing flock is learning the best practices to raise healthy chickens.

brooder with rat snake

This year I’ve had to deal with snakes in the baby chick pen (I got attacked three times!). And illnesses that I had heard of but had never experienced, Fowl pox. We quickly followed instructions we found on the net and got the fowl pox vaccine and gave all our birds a shot. It ran its course and we lost two chickens so that was not too bad.

But the worst experience thus far has been from an epidemic of Crypotosporidium or cryptosporidiosis. Over the past three months I have lost at least one chicken per week to this bacteria outbreak. It is a form of coccidia but cannot be controlled with antibiotics. There is no known cure. What the vet has told me is that the weak get weaker and eventually die, and the strong build up a resistance to it and will live.

Unfortunately in the beginning I had no idea what was wrong with my chickens. I tried the anti-biotic routine, then the pro-biotic with electrolytes in their water, and nothing seemed to help. I could tell the chickens that were infected were losing weight but they continued eating so until they got to the point of death I didn’t realize what was happening. And during this time was when I had the outbreak of Fowl Pox which was probably easily spread due to the weakened immune systems of some of the chickens.

Now since our diagnosis I have read more on this type of disease and the recommended course of action is to separate at first signs of illness. This is usually in the form of diarrhea in my case. Their poop will be a much brighter green than normal and also runny. The disease is spread within the coop by the other poultry walking in their feces so as soon as you see any sign of it it is recommended to isolate the bird that is showing symptoms. After removing the infected bird make sure to thoroughly clean the coop of any poop residue and also use a bleach solution to clean the water to help disinfect.

Once in isolation I give the chicken or chickens electrolytes and pro-biotics. I presently feed a 17% and a 20% protein feed so I switch the chicken to the higher protein feed. Thus far I have had only one bird make it through the isolation period so my success rate has not been very good. But I just learned what I was dealing with about a week ago so I’m keeping a close watch on each pen and watching for any signs.

The vet told us this will eventually run its course but strict bio-security measures are to be followed to get it under control. And with his instruction and the use of the internet I am learning that as you grow your flock to numbers such as I have and raise healthy chickens, it requires a daily routine of cleaning and disinfecting to insure all maintain health.

And with all this writing about raising healthy chickens and bio-security, I want to share with you a link for a calendar for 2010 to help you keep your flock healthy. The calendar is called Backyard Biosecurity: Keeping your Birds Healthy and was sent to me for free from the USDA. Inside are beautiful bird photos and easy-to-read tips and information that will help backyard bird owners learn the hygiene steps to help them take care of their birds. To order yourself a free calendar, visit here.

Tags: chicken disease, cryptosporidiosis, raising chickens