Circovirus - what to do?

[Guest]

Circovirus

 

 

Since a few years, circovirosis is a new threat to our young pigeon population.

Young pigeons, younger than 1 year are very vulnerable to get infected, especially till 4 months old.

Way of infection

For the moment the way of infection isn’t very clear, but probably the virus spreads through the droppings, perhaps also via food or water that is infected, or may be through inhalation. Transmission via the egg is possible but not proven yet.

Symptoms

Once a pigeon is infected, the circo-virus will infect especially those organs that are very important to build up resistance (those are called the lymphoid organs, such as the thymus, the spleen, bone marrow, bursa Fabricius,…)

Because these organs are infected, the pigeons are not capable to make a good, valuable resistance, even against the most common and “harmless” infections, it is possible that they may fail to make any immunity.

Young pigeons in the nest that become infected will become thinner and perhaps die.

Symptoms as lethargy, no appetite, becoming thinner, diarrhea, respiratory problems, lower performances are very common with this disease.

Depending on the severity of the secondary infection, and also the age of the pigeon when it was infected with the virus the pigeon will be severe or not that ill at all (f.e. paratyphus gives much more troubles compared with trichomonas)

Sometimes you can see that the feathers don’t grow like they should be, but for the moment there is no evidence that this problem is caused through this virus.

There are also plenty of infections that are without any symptom.

Diagnosis.

Formerly it was only possible to diagnose this disease after an autopsy on a pigeon by mean of a PCR test on internal organs such as the Bursa Fabricius, but now it is also possible to have a PCR test done on the droppings of the pigeons.

Treatment

At this moment it isn’t possible to cure or to attack the virus itself by means of any medication.

The treatment is especially focused on prevention. Preventing your pigeons to have contact with the virus, this means being hygienic, keeping the pigeons a while in quarantine are very important in this opinion. During flights, the last one is of course not possible.

Therefor it is necessary to be sure that your pigeons can build up an own strong immunity, and that they have an optimum health.

Last but not least, in times of infection with circo-virus, it is very important to treat the secondary infections, this can be trichomoniasis, coccidiosis, paratyphus, adenovirosis,…

Vaccination is not available at this moment.

The Circo-virus is very stable in the environment, it can resist fe 15 minutes a temperature of 75°C. This means that disinfecting a loft against circo is a very hard job to do.

All this is important for the paramyxo-vaccination.

Like I told you earlier in this article, the virus will especially attack all those organs that are very important for building up a good and strong immunity. If this immunity fails, pigeons can die due to this –banal- infection!!

All this means also that infected pigeons cannot have that strong immunity after a vaccination!!!

Suppose you vaccinate your pigeons against paramyxovirosis, but on that moment your pigeons are already infected with the circo-virus. After this vaccination, the pigeons aren’t able to build up an immunity like it should be, because the organs that are responsible to do this are infected and don’t work like they should do!! So, it is possible that a vaccination doesn’t work properly, not due to the vaccin ( fe Colombovac pmv ® or Nobivac paramyxo ®, … are very reliable vaccines) or the way of vaccination, but because there was an infection with circo at that moment.

To prevent all this it is much better to vaccinate your young birds as soon as possible, this means when the youngster are 3 weeks old (so this is the time of weaning the birds)

In this way you prevent (so far as you can prevent it) that the pigeons are already infected with circo-virus before you vaccinate them.

During practice we learned that those pigeons who have been vaccinated very early (on 3 weeks), that they had apparently also a greater resistance against fe adenovirosis.

All this is of course no certainty you won’t have any problem with all the other diseases, but we all see a very positive effect on the immunity of the pigeons after they had been vaccinated when they were very young!!

Vaccinating before three weeks is of no use because the youngsters receive during that period maternal immunity from the parents ( through the egg and the cropmilk.)

Because you vaccinate at the age of 3 weeks, this means you cannot vaccinate at the same time with the pox (not with Colombovac pmv pox® or Ovoperisterin®,)

To build up much resistance against the pox it is necessary that the pigeons are at least 6 weeks.

Some very important tips to vaccinate against paramyxo.

Vaccinate all your youngsters at an age of 3 weeks, pox later at 6 weeks.

Vaccinate only healthy pigeons!!

Vaccinate all your pigeons, the race pigeons, but also the hens and the breeders, because -to be honest- which are the most important of every loft?

 

[Mike]

 

Approximately 30 days ago, I received 6 young birds as a gift from a sucessful and long time flyer, (maybe 6 weeks old, strong & healthy). I had just finished my semi annual coxi/worm/canker 7 day treatment. I put the 6 ybs stright into my young bird loft (I'm an idiot, ok). I've 75 yb and 50 breeders in a connected loft. 10 days after the gift birds arrived 1 of them became sick with massive canker and w/in 12 hours from my observing the onset was dead. Figuring this must be a secondary infection caused by something worse, my vet sent off the bird to the state lab. I issolated the remaining 5 gift birds, scrubbed and disinfected all the lofts, torched the nest boxes. Treated all birds, including the isolated birds, for 7 days with doxycycline (Ornopharma), ronidozole, and trimethoprim - all on the food. The water got garlic/lemon - in substantial doses. Now being followed up with probiotics (5 days) and baby formual added into the food. 7 days after the sick bird died, now, 17 days from introduction of the gift birds into the loft, the lab reported circovirus.

So far no other birds show any signs of being unwell - but the droppings of every bird in the loft have certainly tightened up - including the 5 quarnateened birds. The dead bird showed no signs of loss droppings.

But, now what do I do? The vet said do blood tests on maybe 10 birds, including the 5 quaranteened birds. But, I'm not sure if the expense ($800) will provide any course of action. The literature seems to say that the circovirus is close to impossible to get out of the loft, not responding to disinfectents or heat up to 167 degrees.

What are my choices? Kill all the birds and burn the loft? Just wait until more birds show signs of suspiciously server symptoms of common pigeon diseases? How long do I keep the 5 birds in quarantee? They look unbelievably healthy. Until now my loft has been unusually blessed with good health. Any ideas on what to do?

 

[ROB]

go to the vet and get some terramycin powder mate for the drinker it will kill any thing its a 5 day treatment

[jimmy white]

THERES ENOUGH READING ON "CIRCOVIRUS IN PIGEONS" ON THE WEB TO KEEP YOU GOING A WHILE,, BEST OF LUCK WITH YOUR PROBLEM

[Guest]

Had to read your post a couple of times. Was puzzled that circovirus was given as the cause of death. Think you should ask the lab for clarification.

 

Circovirus attacks the young birds immune system, a bit like human AIDS. Basically destroys the birds ability to defend itself against even minor infections. Seems to me that it was these secondary infections that led to the death. Lab PM will find virus particles present in tissues, rather than the living circovirus, 'circulating' in the body or being shed in the droppings...

 

Question now though is: was only one of the 6 birds infected with Circovirus or were all 6? Your description suggests all 6. Your birds have infected the incomers with run-of-the-mill stuff which your own birds are immune to, not the other way about. The remaining 5 eventually could incubate and become carriers for all sorts of things - a source of infection for your own birds.

 

My advice is you must always act to protect your own flock. Weed out these remaining 5 birds, no matter how well bred they are, while they remain they will always be a potential danger to your own birds..

 

 

 

 

[Guest CS]

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