Young Bird Sickness

[Rooster J. Cogburn]

.

[alex young]

Last wednesday my birds arrived home from the midweek race with YBS.although I won the race the birds were looking really rough and had no appetite even though I only feed depurative on arrival.After a couple of days their droppings started to improve but still eating very little.I missed the weekend race but by Sunday evening the buzz was back in the birds,on Monday morning they flew well same Tuesday but still only eating just less than 1oz of corn.I sent them to the midweek 68mls and finished 3rd in a close race the winner had YBS a couple of weeks earlier.They look well this morning,flapping their wings in the loft ready for a fly (if it stops raining)so if your just prepared to maybe miss a race or two they soon bounce back to good health and are none the worse for it.

[Tony C]

What a few of us are going to try next year is if one of us get it early (pre racing) the others will take a few of these sick y/birds and put them in with our own teams and try to induce the y/b/s into our own teams. The way we see it is if you cant beat it try and work with it.

 

Good or bad idea?

[sammy]

What a few of us are going to try next year is if one of us get it early (pre racing) the others will take a few of these sick y/birds and put them in with our own teams and try to induce the y/b/s into our own teams. The way we see it is if you cant beat it try and work with it.

 

Good or bad idea?

thats a good idea tony then that way you will be clear of it to race them the whole programme

[geordie1234]

What a few of us are going to try next year is if one of us get it early (pre racing) the others will take a few of these sick y/birds and put them in with our own teams and try to induce the y/b/s into our own teams. The way we see it is if you cant beat it try and work with it.

 

Good or bad idea?

Mark Gilbert does the same thing if he gets one with it he puts through the full loft

[Guest IB]

What a few of us are going to try next year is if one of us get it early (pre racing) the others will take a few of these sick y/birds and put them in with our own teams and try to induce the y/b/s into our own teams. The way we see it is if you cant beat it try and work with it.

 

Good or bad idea?

 

I'd be worried that the 'gift' bird was sick with the primary viral illness as well as the secondary illnesses. And amongst the secondary illnesses you can have a range of things like e-coli, cocci, worms, herpesvirus and paramyxo. That's not something I'd willingly bring into my loft.

 

I look for the very first one showing signs - box it, give it 72 hours to pull through, if not, it's a bin job. I've been unfortunate enough to have 1 this year and last, and neither of them survived. And none of the other birds went down with it either.

[just ask me]

i know of a lot of people that will leave ybs spread though there loft on propose before the season they will leave other young birds eat thrown up corn from sick birds to get it over and done with before the racing and i know some of these went on to win the best flier in there fed

[Bilco]

I have to smile. Fanciers don't change with the years. I know fanciers on this thread who use Xerek to treat YBS and they write to me saying how well the birds look after 24 hours, and how they then go on to win afterwards, BUT THEY DO NOT TELL THE FANCY. They say "Why make it harder to win, by telling the rest how to shift it?" They were doing that 30 years ago when respiratory ailments were causing mayhem, until I started writing about the problem and how to cure it. Now its YBS.

I formulated XEREK in 1953 after studying Robert Stroud's books on the treatment of Pigeons/Sparrows/Canaries whilst he was serving a life sentence at Alcatraz for violent Murder. (1921/1942). The formula is a mix of FIVE different Carbonates (and No, Bi-Carb is not one of them, LOL). I made up a jar of the stuff after I had proved its worth and kept it in my "Pigeon Cupboard" all these years, until about ten years ago when Colin McCarthy of Ebbw Vale told me one night in a phone conversation that he was giving up the sport, because he had had YB Sickness three times and had to kill his YB team each time.

I had never heard of YBS, and asked him what on earth he was talking about. When he told me it rang a bell, and I said "don't kill them, I'll send you something that should shift it".

It did, and then he asked if I could also help his clubmates in Ebbw Vale, so I sent him enough for them too. They all recovered. Then Colin asked me to market the stuff, and I discussed it with Richard Wylie, MD of DAZER (UK). The upshot was that I asked for volunteers to trial it, and had 137 replies. I sent each a sample in the SAE they had sent to me. I had 131 replies, ALL were successful. DAZER offered to market it at £5 a sachet so they got the formula. (Five other would-be manufacturers all asked more than £5 a sachet, but I am not in the business of screwing the Fancy). That was ten years ago now, and XEREK is still killing YBS. One sachet is sufficient for 20/25 birds, it makes a gallon of liquid, fill the drinkers three days running, but it works in one/two. You can obtain it from DAZER (UK) at 16 Thorpe Meadows, Peterborough, Cambs. PE3 6GA (Tel: 01733-315-888)or from me, (Tel: 01963-34380). It is not an antibiotic, it is a chemical compound given as a dietary supplement to cancel out the yeasts and mycotoxins found on corn mixtures, that create a fungal growth in the crop, the cause of the complaint in my opinion.

[PIGEON_MAN]

I have to smile. Fanciers don't change with the years. I know fanciers on this thread who use Xerek to treat YBS and they write to me saying how well the birds look after 24 hours, and how they then go on to win afterwards, BUT THEY DO NOT TELL THE FANCY. They say "Why make it harder to win, by telling the rest how to shift it?" They were doing that 30 years ago when respiratory ailments were causing mayhem, until I started writing about the problem and how to cure it. Now its YBS.

I formulated XEREK in 1953 after studying Robert Stroud's books on the treatment of Pigeons/Sparrows/Canaries whilst he was serving a life sentence at Alcatraz for violent Murder. (1921/1942). The formula is a mix of FIVE different Carbonates (and No, Bi-Carb is not one of them, LOL). I made up a jar of the stuff after I had proved its worth and kept it in my "Pigeon Cupboard" all these years, until about ten years ago when Colin McCarthy of Ebbw Vale told me one night in a phone conversation that he was giving up the sport, because he had had YB Sickness three times and had to kill his YB team each time.

I had never heard of YBS, and asked him what on earth he was talking about. When he told me it rang a bell, and I said "don't kill them, I'll send you something that should shift it".

It did, and then he asked if I could also help his clubmates in Ebbw Vale, so I sent him enough for them too. They all recovered. Then Colin asked me to market the stuff, and I discussed it with Richard Wylie, MD of DAZER (UK). The upshot was that I asked for volunteers to trial it, and had 137 replies. I sent each a sample in the SAE they had sent to me. I had 131 replies, ALL were successful. DAZER offered to market it at £5 a sachet so they got the formula. (Five other would-be manufacturers all asked more than £5 a sachet, but I am not in the business of screwing the Fancy). That was ten years ago now, and XEREK is still killing YBS. One sachet is sufficient for 20/25 birds, it makes a gallon of liquid, fill the drinkers three days running, but it works in one/two. You can obtain it from DAZER (UK) at 16 Thorpe Meadows, Peterborough, Cambs. PE3 6GA (Tel: 01733-315-888)or from me, (Tel: 01963-34380). It is not an antibiotic, it is a chemical compound given as a dietary supplement to cancel out the yeasts and mycotoxins found on corn mixtures, that create a fungal growth in the crop, the cause of the complaint in my opinion.

Very interested in any thoughts people have on this product.

[budgie]

One thing for sure the Guys who have the problems should be up front and refrain from racing .

[robbiedoo.]

One thing for sure the Guys who have the problems should be up front and refrain from racing .

 

well i,m one of them thats up front and refraining from racing . :crying:

[Wiley]

Very interested in any thoughts people have on this product.

 

Would never be without it, my pigeon had young bird sickness last thursday, different birds after the first 24 hours in my opinion after 48 hours every bird was back to full health.

 

My old man used xerex, before last saturdays race, for 3 days, 1st,2nd and 3rd club, 1st 2nd and 3rd federation. This isn't the first time we have been in this situation after using this product. Have often thought about using it on a weekly basis, but have never done so, as they have always flown well after the initial treatment.

 

Its the one thing i wouldnt be without and i buy it in bulk from Blackpool, same can be said for my old man. Bill has many stories of this great product one of them that i always remember is about a fancier in south africa maybe bill can tell the story.

 

The product is the best out there for the young bird sickness purpose, but you also need good management and good pigeons, just giving it isn't going to give you miracle racing results, but if your bird have young bird sickness it defiantly will get rid of it and get rid of it FAST.

[quackie]

never tried it never had ybs but im restarting again i guess it would be handy to sore incase how much is this stuff

[Guest IB]

Very interested in any thoughts people have on this product.

 

I'd be interested to know how it was determined what disease(s) was actually being treated, and how it was known that it was cured.

 

YBS was one of the many things that didn't exist when I kept pigeons as a teenager, and I'd bother finding out just what it was. And I'm not alone, because researchers have the same difficulties:-

 

 

‘‘Young bird sickness’’ is a term used by racing pigeon fanciers to describe a condition that has occurred regularly in recent years and affects pigeons in their first year of life. It is characterized by slow crop emptying, regurgitation, diarrhea, weight loss, poor performance, and occasionally death. Little scientific information is known about this syndrome to differentiate it from other diseases that occur in young pigeonsâ€.

 

“Infections with pigeon circovirus (PiCV) occur in young racing pigeons and have been reported worldwide . Infections have been identified in weaned pigeons between 1 and 4 months of age, and are associated with a broad range of clinical signs, including lethargy, weight loss, respiratory distress, diarrhoea and poor racing performance . In racing pigeons this combination of clinical signs is commonly described by pigeon fanciers as ‘‘young pigeon sickness’’. PiCV DNA was detected in tissues of 13/20 apparently healthy older birds, aged from 1 to 9 years. Viral DNA was most commonly detected in the respiratory organs, including the trachea, pharynx and lung, followed by tissues such as the spleen, kidney and liver. It was also detected in the ovary and/or testes of some birds. This finding, and the detection of viral DNA in tissues from 8/22 embryos, suggested that PiCV may be vertically transmitted. Testing of pharyngeal and cloacal swabs, and blood samples, collected immediately before the death of the adult pigeons, failed to detect all birds found to be infected at necropsy, suggesting that testing of potential breeding birds would not enable exclusion of infected birds from breeding

programmes. Additional PCR testing of cloacal swab samples obtained sequentially from 19 young pigeons showed that while four were excreting virus when 15 days old, only one bird was excreting at the time of weaning (28 days old). The detection of viral DNA in cloacal swab samples from 15.8% of the birds when 37 days old and 100% of birds when 51 days old suggested that most young pigeons probably became infected in the rearing loft.â€

How could this possibly be cured in 72 hours and birds be fit to go back into the race basket?

[Bilco]

Because maybe - just maybe - our pigeons are not suffering from PiCB, but something simple but a temporarily crippling ailment called (for want of a better term) YBS ?

[GREENGRASS]

Bill can I ask if any fanciers have used it as a preventative measure to see if the ybs can be kept at bay or is it just for treatment once it strikes.

[Bilco]

Bill can I ask if any fanciers have used it as a preventative measure to see if the ybs can be kept at bay or is it just for treatment once it strikes.

 

Because my answer may lead to accusations of "plugging" I have sent you a PM. Cheers, Bill.

[Wiley]

Because my answer may lead to accusations of "plugging" I have sent you a PM. Cheers, Bill.

 

Bill, as you know i am a great fan of the stuff, is it possible to get a similar pm?

[clockman]

Bill, as you know i am a great fan of the stuff, is it possible to get a similar pm?

 

Me too

[Bilco]

Bill, as you know i am a great fan of the stuff, is it possible to get a similar pm?

 

 

Sorry, this was a PM to Wiley only.

[crasswell kid]

Sorry, this was a PM to Wiley only.

ROBERT STROUD KNEW A THING OR TWO, RIGHT BILCO.

[columreid8]

i think myself that after 20yrs of this virus doing it's rounds federations don't do anything to help fanciers with this ailment and are miles down the road before fanciers get their birds fit to race again and fanciers are not willing to "jump" young birds 100mls or so most fanciers get it just before the 1st race or after the 1st race so by the time you treat/rest the young birds minimum 2 wks after treatment their seasons over,i put a proposal a few years ago into my own fed which was accepted and that was that we raced the first 3 races i.e coldsream.coldstream,otterburn and after the first 3 races we came back to the start and started again .with a bit of tweaking i think we endeded up with coldsream,otterburn,otterburn then back to coldstream,otterburn and then carried on the programme it was a total success with plenty of experienced young birds left at the end of the year what happened the following agm the horse them down the road brigade got it changed back so what can we do

Hi

The NIPA allow you to buy the basket for the whole young bird season, so its only ur youngbirds in it. This should be the practice everywhere. For those that dont send many, yes this can be more expensive, but cheaper in the long run. I bought a crate and only had 9 in it. I didnt care about the cost.

Also i do believe that the paramyxio vaccine is one of the major causes of young bird sickness. When you read the leaflet, it weakens your young birds immune system. So the work you put in to ensure your youngbirds build up a good immunity, is then wiped out by the vaccine.

[greenlands]

Hi

The NIPA allow you to buy the basket for the whole young bird season, so its only ur youngbirds in it. This should be the practice everywhere. For those that dont send many, yes this can be more expensive, but cheaper in the long run. I bought a crate and only had 9 in it. I didnt care about the cost.

Also i do believe that the paramyxio vaccine is one of the major causes of young bird sickness. When you read the leaflet, it weakens your young birds immune system. So the work you put in to ensure your youngbirds build up a good immunity, is then wiped out by the vaccine.

I put a reply on as regards each member in our club doing the same but be carefull should there be a holdover the convoyer will feed each basket as if they were full,we top up,fanciers in agreement.

 

Lindsay

[hawked again]

Next time you have a bird with YBS stick it in a pen with two healthy ones with colodial silver and a drop or two of elderberry juice in the water. The healthy ones will not catch it.

[Guest Owen]

Like a lot of others I have suffered with YBS in the past. And again like a lot of others I bought medicines and cures and treated the birds with everything going. Then I started to think about it and came to the following conclusions. If, as is believed, YBS is caused by a virus then there are four conclusions. 1) nothing can cure is but vaccination can prevent it. 2) antibiotics and medicines can treat the after effects of the disease but nothing else. 3)if it is a virus the birds can not have it a second time. 4) antibiotics and strong medicines ruin the birds' immune system and will leave you with even bigger problems.

I do not get the disease these days and I do not buy preventitives or cures at all. I allow the loft to have a build up of dry droppings which helps to strengthen the immune system. By using the Bull System of breeding I found that certain cocks produced the disease in their young so I killed them. I only breed from winning pigeons so that the breeders are proven to be naturally healthy. When the youngsters are weaned off I am continually looking for weak birds and cull them quickly so that they will not cause problems for the others. My loft is designed to promote very good ventilation and the roof is constructed to create a chimney effect which eliminates repiritory problems. My birds are fed all they want without leaving food about and they have a low potein diet which I think is more natural. I check the birds droppings regularly with my microscope and treat for worms and canker as and when I need to do. I reared 40 birds this year and I have lost 3 racing and training up to now, which I reckon is way above average in most lofts, so something must be right.

I hope this helps.