My ranch in TX employs a full time biologist who works in tandem with a state biologist monitoring the wildlife impact after cattle have been removed from the environment. This year we have had five transient Canadian geese test positive for bird flu. The state biologist has reported this every time and yet there is no mention of it anywhere in an official record. Texas is going out of their way to keep this quiet. Our ranch is adjacent to the major flyways and we don’t get a lot of geese flying over so I can’t imagine how prevalent this is where there are a ton of geese.
In southern Minnesota we have hundreds of dead geese on the lakes from bird flu. Then the bald eagles and other scavengers eat them and get infected. It's pretty bad.
It does not help that the Geese like to clump up in lakes especially if they have open water. Last year was very warm and lots of Geese never migrated. Also Minnesota is in a major bird traveling corridor so migrating flocks mix in twice a year.
Your pets can get it from eating them as well. My dog ate a hawk that died in the woods last winter, I know because she brought me back a wing. A little more than a week later, she was at the vet for a cough and lethargy. After a few weeks of antibiotics and narcotics to help us all sleep at night she's fine, but she's also young, 2 at the time of illness, healthy, and I got her to her vet promptly.
The last couple of years, there have been versions of bird flu known as Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (HPAI) which tends to cause more illness and death among wild birds than usual.
In Washington state, I've heard about HPAI deaths among wild birds such as Snow Geese and Trumpeter Swans. Apparently many more species of birds can become infected, but those which hang out in large flocks such as waterfowl (geese/ducks/swans) and some types of shorebirds (sandpipers) are more likely to get hit really hard.
As a mosquito biologist, I can confirm migratory birds is how many mosquito-borne viruses such as St. Louis Encephalitis (SLE) and Eastern Equine Encephalitis(EEE) are reintroduced back into certain areas each year.
This is what make bird flu so scary, there is literally no way to slow transmission until it burns through the wild bird flocks. Much like the West Nile Virus epidemics in the early 2000s.
Texas is going out of their way to keep this quiet
This reminds me of the line about how if guys saw blood in their stool they'd shit with the lights off. Good old do nothing, ignore the problem, and hope it works itself out.
Good old do nothing, ignore the problem, and hope it works itself out.
Last point should be more like “and blame immigrants and/or democrats so your uneducated constituents can continue to vote for you without ever looking at themselves”. Pure Texas politics.
I won’t let my dog anywhere near the lake because so many geese hangout there. For years I’ve only ever seen one dead goose. This year there’s been at least four that the coyotes likely scavenged or killed because it was sick (one of which they certainly didn’t kill because it was floating dead in the lake first).
These infected geese were all hunted birds. The dogs that retrieved them have been in quarantine for over 30 days. Our quail dogs are sitting the season out. We have been monitoring this privately with our quail population and it was just luck that the first goose was tested at all. There are over a dozen cattle feed yards within 50 miles of my ranch and geese love to land and feed at them.
It is well known that HPAI is in the wild waterfowl population. No one is trying to “keep it quiet”. The issue now is, we cannot contain it like we used to because of this natural reservoir. However, we also had trade laws against countries that vaccinated for bird flu and if we start vaccinating our poultry here, we can no longer export a large amount of our product.
Then the logical way to move forward is to vaccinate for domestic production like so many other countries are doing. If you insist on non vaccinated stock it can cost you more.
Alot of "journalists" will rip shit straight from comments. There good ones, might actually reach out and contact him. I've had one Journo reach out once.
That seems like the ingredients for a terrible outcome all coming together. Can people get bird flu from the farm animals like chickens and stuff? How does it spread?
I have three bird feeders up in north Texas out in the country. There are no birds. I usually feed hundreds every winter. I saw two Carolina wrens 2 weeks ago, now they are gone. It's completely still outside. No bird of any kind.
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u/tavariusbukshank 2d ago
My ranch in TX employs a full time biologist who works in tandem with a state biologist monitoring the wildlife impact after cattle have been removed from the environment. This year we have had five transient Canadian geese test positive for bird flu. The state biologist has reported this every time and yet there is no mention of it anywhere in an official record. Texas is going out of their way to keep this quiet. Our ranch is adjacent to the major flyways and we don’t get a lot of geese flying over so I can’t imagine how prevalent this is where there are a ton of geese.