Vaccinations

Vaccinations

Young birds need to be vaccinated for PMV, Pox and Paratyphoid four weeks before you start training. This will give them plenty of time to recover from any side efffects of the vaccinations before you start training. Young birds need this chance for their immune system to recover, so they can handle the young bird races.

All the birds in your coops need to be revaccinated for PMV two weeks before you start breeding. It is a big expense every year to do this, but the risks are too great without it. Years ago, the risk was small, but with breeders and flyers shipping birds all over the world now, the chances of your birds being exposed to disease are much greater.

I have spent a great deal of money to acquire the excellent stock birds that I have in my loft. Many of them could not be replaced. I would not want to risk losing any of them to disease when it can be so easily prevented. It is worth it to me, to spend the money on the vaccines and the time to administer them. In return, I prevent any problems with my birds.

I have been vaccinating my birds since 1996. The year before this, my young birds got sick right in the middle of a great winning season for me. I had to stop flying my birds. I ended up losing almost all of the birds to the disease. The few that did survive never really flew well after that and I have culled them. I never want to go through another season like that one, so I vaccinate regularly.

Once others in your club and combine start vaccinating, you almost have to do it. The birds that have been vaccinated become carriers and can transmit the disease to other pigeons. You put your birds and your whole investment at risk if you don't vaccinate.

Since the season that my birds got sick, we have had several more seasons when lots of flyers lost their whole team to disease. They didn't understand the information they had been given and put their birds at risk by not vaccinating them.

It is expensive and a pain, but if you want to fly pigeons, vaccinations are part of the game now. You won't win for long without them.

Adeno Virus in 2001

In the fall of 2001, we had put together two fabulous young bird teams to fly. The kids were going to fly one team and Craig would fly the other team. We were so excited to fly and hoped that we would have another fantastic winning season like we had done the year before. We were also excited because The Northern Utah Combine was going to join with the rest of the flyers along the Wasatch Front and fly as a Wasatch Front Concourse on a trial basis. This would give us the opprotunity to compete with much larger numbers of pigeons. The first week we had a great race and took sixth place in the club, the combine and the concourse. We also had twenty nine pigeons who earned points on the races.

The next week we had some really unusual hot weather. I wanted to train my pigeons, but because of some early morning meetings, I could not take them on a long enough toss before work in the morning. My oldest daughter took them out right after school on Tuesday afternoon. The birds did not look or feel their best, so I had my daughter let them out for a shorter toss.It was a really hot afternoon, so I worried about them, but thought for sure they would make it home fine.

The results of that toss were scary. The pigeons did not come home. I lost about twenty pigeons on what should have been an easy toss. I knew something was just not quite right. As the week progressed, the birds did not recover well from the previous week. Friday night, I took my birds over to the club to enter them in the race, then my wife and I left to drive to Colorado for the Spirit of Colorado pigeon race. We drove all night long.

The next day, the race at home was a disaster. I had huge losses again. The birds that did come home looked terrible. My daughter and my brother, David clocked them in. We placed fifth and ninth in the race, but had terrible returns on the race, getting back only about twenty of sixty pigeons on the first day. We knew we had a health problem that needed immediate attention. As I waited for the pigeons to come in for the Spirit of Colorado race, my mind kicked into gear and started analyzing all of the clues to this problem.

Week two as I had put pigeons in the race crates, I had noticed feed in the crates. Some birds had thrown up the food that was in their craw on the previous race. This would be easy for other birds to eat while in the race crates on the way to the race. My birds had gotten sick within three days of this first race, so that gave me an incubation time on the disease. I guessed that the birds that had not returned from the training toss and the race had been sick and died on the way home. My birds had not recovered from the race and they had been really light on their weight all week. I had also noticed foul smelling droppings in the loft, but I had been so busy getting ready to leave for the Colorado race that I had not payed attention to all of these signs.

I took the opportunity to discuss things with a great friend of mine, Frank McLaughlin. He immediately thought I had the Adeno Virus and told me all that he knew about the disease. On Sunday evening when we got home from Colorado, I called another great friend, Mike Brown in California. He also thought I was dealing with the Adeno Virus.

Monday morning, I made a call to Jedd's to see what medications they had to deal with this new virus. They recommended I treat with Ammoxicillin for three weeks. The Adeno Virus is a virus and therefore antibiotics will not kill the virus. However, the antibiotic would help stop the spread of secondary infections that would hit as the pigeons' immunitiy systems were low. I ordered it and started to treat the pigeons as soon as it arrived. A few more pigeons made it home on Sunday and Monday, but they did not look great.

By this time, my whole young bird team seemed to be infected. I decided not to continue flying the season and to let my birds have time to recover. I had some really great birds that I did not want to lose and I felt like it was my fault for letting the problem get out of hand before I recognized it. I hoped my pigeons would recover and be ready to fly in the spring. The antibiotic helped and most of my pigeons recovered just fine. The few that did not respond to the medication were culled.

I watched the rest of the season carefully as the other flyers in the club continued to send birds each week. I knew that others in the club must also have sick birds. The losses that season were tremendous. The returns from the races were so poor. Each week the number of lofts diminished and the number of birds being sent diminished. Even though these flyers knew why I had quit racing, most were unwilling to admit they had sick birds or to do anything to stop the progress of the Adeno Virus. I am grateful that I chose to stop flying because some of the birds that recovered from this illness proved to be great flyers and breeders later on.

Adeno Virus in 2004

Things change as more information is learned. This fall, 2004, my young bird team again got hit with the Adeno Virus. I sent healthy birds to a training toss just prior to the first race. By midweek, I was dealing with sick birds as the virus attacked my pigeon team. Experience helps. This time, I immediately recognized the foul odor from the droppings, the pigeons who were vomiting their food up, the drop in weight of each sick pigeon. I called Jedds again for help.

The treatment had changed a little as they had also learned how to best handle this virus. They again prescribed Ammoxicillan to help with the secondary infections, Adeno Zap, which is a Break Through product, as a gut treatment, Electrolytes and lots of rest. I immediately started the treatment and my pigeons responded. I had caught it early enough that only part of my pigeons were sick. I treated them all anyway. I have continued to use the Adeno Zap each week as a gut treatment because I know that there are still birds being sent to the races who are carrying the Adeno Virus. Since it is a virus, birds can get it more than one time.

Because I have a large team, I was able to still send a team of 36 healthy birds on the first race. I placed 17th thru 21st in a concourse of 1,414 pigeons. I felt really good about these results.

The pigeons that were sick responded really well to the treatment and within a week they were all looking really good again. I sent 87 birds on the second race and won the concourse race, taking the first six places, plus 15th, 16th and 17th place in a field of 1,251 pigeons. Amazing considering many of these birds had just recoverd from being sick.

Week three was phenomenal. I sent 87 pigeons and on the north section of the concourse I took 45 out of 50 of the top places, including 1st thru 26th place. This result includes 838 pigeons. I am still waiting to get the results for the entire councourse to see how I did there. From what I have heard, I believe I won the entire concourse. I still can't believe that many birds came screaming home!

Week four was another good week for the loft. It was a hard race with really tough headwinds. I sent 77 birds and won the north section of the concourse with a bird that was almost 15 minutes ahead of the second place bird. I had six birds in the top ten percent and another eleven birds in the top twenty percent. There were 386 birds in this result, so you can see the returns were not really great from this race compared to the week before, yet I had 17 of my birds home when I went to knock off my clock. Early on the morning after the race,another 43 birds arrived. Then the headwinds picked up and it rained and stormed the rest of the day. I was only missing fifteen birds out of my 77. Hopefully they will come in when the weather clears. I will have to wait for the whole concourse result to see how I did, but we are really excited to see how quickly the birds have recovered from the Adeno Virus.

My point is this: You have to be aware of what is going on in your loft and use the knowledge you acquire to keep your pigeons healthy and disease free. Take the time to feel and handle your birds daily. Look for signs of illness. Though you may think it gross to examine bird droppings, that is usually one of the quickest and surest ways to know if your birds are healthy or not. Take time to observe your birds so that you can tell when something is different in the loft.

New stuff will come along all the time to knock your birds down. You have to be prepared to take care of it and act quickly to help your birds. If you let it get out of hand, then it will take much longer to overcome and you will lose great pigeons in the process. You certainly won't win very many races with sick birds.

Talk to people who are knowledgeable. Make friends with other flyers and use that network of friends to help you in times of trouble. I would be happy to discuss any health related problems you are having with your birds. Having been around pigeons for most of my life, I have encountered nearly everything that is currently out there. I can probably help you determine what you have and help you find the right treatment for it. If I can't give you the answers, I can help direct you to someone who can. I have found that the employees at Jedd's are really helpful and friendly.

One last word: It often costs a lot to keep pigeons healthy. Vaccinations, vitamins and medications are all very expensive and as yet, there are no health insurance plans that cover pigeons. Usually it is cheaper to prevent problems than to treat them. To me it is worth the cost. You will have to decide for yourself if it is worth the cost for your loft. Many times it is the difference between a loft that wins and those that don't.