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palusbuteoI'm worried about the Avian flu that's going up like wildfire in the US very recently.
I wonder/worry if it's a strain of covd that has transmitted to birds.
As I understand it, C-19 was originally present in bats (I believe is the current theory) and that it jumped to humans.
also as I understand it, many strains of avian flu have jumped to humans over the years.
I was working in wildlife care when West Nile Virus went rampant in the US and (we) were losing birds left and right and it was getting pretty scary.
Some of us wondered how safe we were, of being "exposed" to it (although at the time they weren't as concerned about avian flu as they were rabies with mammals admitted or botulism and aspergillosis with birds. And salmonella is a problem with reptiles and turtles, which i didn't really know about until then. And the more prevalent issue was bird pink eye, especially among Finches....Sometimes I wonder(ed) what I had been exposed to in my years there)
One of the Raptor rehabber/educators (I) knew then and had drawn many of his birds, allegedly got sick with WNV and suspected it jumped from one of his birds. His Snowy Owl was admitted to the clinic for treatment & observation with a suspicion that the owl had it.
(I actually got to hold it for an exam and let me tell you how stupidly fluffy like a super fluffy stuffed animal toy fluffy it was, but thankfully b/c it's a Snowy it has very powerful feet/grasping strength and stupidly sharp talons, and a pension for biting very hard, I wasn't as tempted to try and nuzzle/snuggle it as I might have been I still remember one public ed. program this guy gave I was at, the owl nipped him on the top of the hand and it bled through like 5 bandaids for the rest of the program. he said it kept re-opening and bleeding for a week)
But both managed to survive pretty well. Although this guy retired/left doing bird programs and the Snowy got transferred to a couple out in PA but last I heard the owl was doing just fine.
It's not just chickens it can devestate. Although chickens are much easier to help than wild birds.
I wonder/worry if it's a strain of covd that has transmitted to birds.
As I understand it, C-19 was originally present in bats (I believe is the current theory) and that it jumped to humans.
also as I understand it, many strains of avian flu have jumped to humans over the years.
I was working in wildlife care when West Nile Virus went rampant in the US and (we) were losing birds left and right and it was getting pretty scary.
Some of us wondered how safe we were, of being "exposed" to it (although at the time they weren't as concerned about avian flu as they were rabies with mammals admitted or botulism and aspergillosis with birds. And salmonella is a problem with reptiles and turtles, which i didn't really know about until then. And the more prevalent issue was bird pink eye, especially among Finches....Sometimes I wonder(ed) what I had been exposed to in my years there)
One of the Raptor rehabber/educators (I) knew then and had drawn many of his birds, allegedly got sick with WNV and suspected it jumped from one of his birds. His Snowy Owl was admitted to the clinic for treatment & observation with a suspicion that the owl had it.
(I actually got to hold it for an exam and let me tell you how stupidly fluffy like a super fluffy stuffed animal toy fluffy it was, but thankfully b/c it's a Snowy it has very powerful feet/grasping strength and stupidly sharp talons, and a pension for biting very hard, I wasn't as tempted to try and nuzzle/snuggle it as I might have been I still remember one public ed. program this guy gave I was at, the owl nipped him on the top of the hand and it bled through like 5 bandaids for the rest of the program. he said it kept re-opening and bleeding for a week)
But both managed to survive pretty well. Although this guy retired/left doing bird programs and the Snowy got transferred to a couple out in PA but last I heard the owl was doing just fine.
It's not just chickens it can devestate. Although chickens are much easier to help than wild birds.
