# Blackhead Disease and declining turkeys?



## BeardsandSpurs (Mar 24, 2015)

A guy recently brought it to attention, but have y'all ever thought about these farmers spreading chicken litter on their fields before preparation could be harmless to the turkeys? There is a disease called histomoniasis or blackhead disease that I've been researching. Chickens are pretty resistant to this disease and can also act as carriers. These chickens that could carry the disease, live their live, eat, crap, and sleep, and then the crap is used by farmers on their fields to prepare it for the next crop. The disease is in the fecal matter. While in the field, earthworms and other insects feed off the disease inflicted matter, and then the wild turkey eats it...causing it to become infected with the blackhead disease. Just something for y'all to research and think about it. Farmers started using chicken litter in our parts about 10 years ago and now that all the old hens are dying out, we haven't been seeing many at all. Usually, a field that has 20 turkeys has 3-5. The population just seems to be down in our part of the woods. Y'all let me know what you think.


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## trophyslayer (Mar 24, 2015)

Population is up where I hunt and it only started rising when we started really concentrating on the hog problem.


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## Zombie woof (Mar 24, 2015)

Valid question. I've heard this theory and agree the risk is real. The only challenge is getting the farmer to change fertilizer. However, I wouldn't count on it unless you are the land owner and leasing the land to the farmer or have a really, really good relationship with the farmer. Those guys got enough on their plate and frankly, I haven't met many who prioritize maintaining turkey populations over yielding a strong harvest. I wish they would do away with it though...due to the simple fact that it makes hunting almost unbearable when the wind shifts into your direction!


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## dark horse (Mar 24, 2015)

trophyslayer said:


> Population is up where I hunt and it only started rising when we started really concentrating on the hog problem.



The area the original poster is speaking of has very few hogs.


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## mauser64 (Mar 24, 2015)

I've wondered the same thing. It affects all gallinaceous birds ( quail ). Our place has a good bit of agriculture around it that gets chicken litter on it. This morning I spent three hours walking around our thousand acres in Warren county  and found no reason to make me want to go back. I still think timber practices has the most impact on them tho.


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## spitfire (Mar 24, 2015)

I agree 100 % with the theory that poultry diseases associated with chicken houses/litter are a factor in the decline of the wild turkey. The trouble is that chickens are big business in Georgia and getting regulations in place to help protect our turkey flock will most likely go no where. Too much money involved with chicken farming!


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## southGAlefty (Mar 24, 2015)

spitfire said:


> I agree 100 % with the theory that poultry diseases associated with chicken houses/litter are a factor in the decline of the wild turkey. The trouble is that chickens are big business in Georgia and getting regulations in place to help protect our turkey flock will most likely go no where. Too much money involved with chicken farming!



This is true on all points.

The thing is that *most* poultry diseases die when the host (chicken) is removed. I'd have to do some research as to whether or not blackhead is one that can survive in the litter without a host. 

A lot of growers are going to the use of stack sheds where they store the litter for a time prior to selling it to farmers, hypothetically killing any organisms in the litter with the absence of the host.

The cost of fertilizer is pretty high, I don't see chicken litter going away anytime soon.


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## dark horse (Mar 24, 2015)

southGAlefty said:


> This is true on all points.
> 
> The thing is that *most* poultry diseases die when the host (chicken) is removed. I'd have to do some research as to whether or not blackhead is one that can survive in the litter without a host.
> 
> ...




Unfortunately, histomoniasis is a protozoan that lives encapsulated within the egg of a cecal worm.  It is incredibly hardy and can remain viable in soil up to 3 years.  In addition, earthworms ingest the eggs of the cecal worm as well and thus become a host that turkeys then eat from the tainted soil.


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## BeardsandSpurs (Mar 24, 2015)

I think I'm going to do some research and ask some of my bio professors about this. I think it is really affecting our area's turkey population.


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## Coon Dog (Mar 24, 2015)

My brother studied this at abac college always told me chicken litter was bad didn't think about it much but I no one spot that fields would be loaded with turkeys counted 31 bearded turkeys and 70 to 80 hens there before that was 10 or 12 years ago now you lucky to see 10 to 15 and that's counting a flock of hens and bearded turkeys


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## Melvin4730 (Mar 24, 2015)

One problem with the theory....they have been putting chicken litter on fields for over 30 years.


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## BeardsandSpurs (Mar 24, 2015)

Found a pretty good website that talks about this.

http://www.mdwfp.com/wildlife-hunti...ory/will-disease-decrease-turkey-numbers.aspx


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## icdedturkes (Mar 24, 2015)

MI Bird we really have no chicken farms to speak of..


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## birddog52 (Mar 25, 2015)

Well any where you have high number of poultry farms and the farmers spreading the chicken litter on the fields you can bet your turkey numbers will go down. Its not the only thing hurting turkey numbers but its one of many around this area plus high number of hogs and lack diversity in te habiat on usfs service lands no new timber cuts


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## birddog52 (Mar 25, 2015)

Yes ole thats true but 25 years ago we had a lot more turkeys in this area than you do and and alot more pultry farms what your not getting is that domestic poultry even pen reared quail carry diseases.that wildlife birds even song birds do not have any resistance too. Plus these days the chicken farmers don,t clean out there houses as often as they did years ago before getting a new batch of chickens ( been turkey hunting in north ga for 35 years and no where near the turkeys we had 20 years ago.


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## Dustin Pate (Mar 25, 2015)

Well my in-laws have chicken houses and routinely spread litter on there numerous hay fields. The place is eat up with turkeys.


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## C.Killmaster (Mar 26, 2015)

Stick with broiler litter and you'll be okay:

"Recent research has shown that infections
with both Histomonas meleagridis
and Heterakis gallinarum differ
greatly among commercial broilers,
which are essentially free of these
parasites, present virtually no histomonias
risk when used as fertilizer
on wildlife habitat. Litter from
breeder birds or layers usually is
contaminated with both the cecal
roundworm and the protozoan that
causes histomoniasis and should
not be used as fertilizer on wildlife
habitat. "

http://www.nwtf.org/conservation/bulletins/bulletin_25.pdf


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## Loder (Mar 26, 2015)

Have any of you heard that regular fertilizer kills them as well?

One of the timber Cos on a large property I hunt has been fertilizing heavily in recent years.  The turkey population on that particular property has been on a steady decline over the past decade, so much so that it's not worth hunting land that was once thriving with flocks.  I've been wondering if the increased amount of fertilize by the timber Co has had an impact.


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## ProphesyMountainHunter (Mar 26, 2015)

I am actually apart of a team at UGA that is doing some research with histomonas meleagridis in turkeys. I am an undergrad in poultry science working under two doctorate students.We are actually terminating the trial tomorrow to gather final data. But as of right now, it is obvious that this is a very deadly disease in turkeys. I will say that I am by no means an expert on this disease, I mainly do the dirty work around the farm and lab, but I have picked up on a thing or two. We are not working with wild turkey species but rather commercial turkeys. Nonetheless, if you do notice that a bird you take looked sickly or acted irregular (one example being the "vulture posture," if you see the bird with it shoulders high and neck down, leaned over, this can be a sign of infection). The bird can be infected and nothing be different about the head.  If you see abnormalities, I would check a few things before bringing the animal home and definitely before eating. Look at the liver first, it will be obvious that something is wrong. The liver will have yellowish circle-like lesions on it liver. This is the easiest to see. Another easy tell is the smell with not be pleasant.  You may see that toward the end of the intestine in an area called the ceca there is a hardening of the soft tissue. This is due to material inside the ceca building up as a by product of the disease.  It is something we should be aware of but right now it is not a huge problem with wild birds. More so in commercial industry. Just to address one comment I read,  I'm not sure why broiler house litter would differ from layer houses. Most broiler houses in Georgia will keep litter on the floor and accumulating for about 5 to 6 years with the oldest ever received by the department being 10 years old. I would think that this would be just as infected as breeder houses. I will say again, however, that I am not an expert on the matter whatsoever.


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## ChattNFHunter (Mar 26, 2015)

Not an expert here by any means but if I had to guess as to why broiler litter is safe and breeder litter is not, is probably because of the age at which broilers are marketed.  6 to 7 weeks is not a very long time VS the 60 week or more life of a breeder.  The breeders probably have more time to become infected and remain a host for the Histamonas and generate more of the parasite, where as the broilers are grown and processed before they can be infected.  Don't know for sure but that's the only theory I could come up with based on my knowledge of the two.  
Also, I will say that my family grows pullets and we do not clean out our houses down to the dirt very often (multiple years) where as I know many broiler growers that clean out basically to the dirt every year or 2 so this might help with keeping the parasite from remaining within the houses.  I do know that we used to have turkeys on our property for a short period of time but we spread litter on our pastures from time to time and I have noticed we have no turkeys and even this past summer I heard no Bobwhites calling at all.  I might have to change our fertilizing strategies.  No amount of fertilizing on pasture land is worth it if it is at the expense of wildlife.


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## horny1 (Mar 27, 2015)

Way more people hunting them now. I remember hunting them before it was cool. Bout like watetfowl. Plenty of turkey thugs and duck commanders running around killing those "thunder chickens".


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## horny1 (Mar 27, 2015)

But I did kill a pretty nasty gobbler in a field that's spread annually.  He had growths all over his wings but nothing on head. The year before there was one that would always lay in the field. Sometimes for a couple hours. Never killed him so it may be the one I killed the following year.


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## C.Killmaster (Mar 27, 2015)

ProphesyMountainHunter said:


> Just to address one comment I read,  I'm not sure why broiler house litter would differ from layer houses. Most broiler houses in Georgia will keep litter on the floor and accumulating for about 5 to 6 years with the oldest ever received by the department being 10 years old. I would think that this would be just as infected as breeder houses. I will say again, however, that I am not an expert on the matter whatsoever.



It doesn't matter how long the litter stays in the barn, broiler chickens are slaughtered long before the round-worm can complete it's life cycle.  Since the disease is transmitted to other birds via the worm's eggs (produced at the end of the worm's life cycle), broiler litter is safe.  

The author of the article I linked, W.R. Davidson, was a professor of wildlife disease at UGA.  I took his 10 credit hour wildlife disease course not long before he retired.


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## The mtn man (Mar 27, 2015)

Not sure that all broilers are slaughtered that early, my brother in law gets full grown broilers as layers, they keep them for quite a while before they are removed from his chicken houses, I know this because I didn't know broilers were used for layers, I didn't know they layed brown eggs, so he told me they were broilers, I was surprised, so I would assume that liter from a 2 year old broiler, would be the same as a 2 year old leghorn , I think he keeps his broilers 2 years if I understood him.


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## Klondike (Mar 27, 2015)

52 days on the broilers


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## The mtn man (Mar 28, 2015)

Klondike said:


> 52 days on the broilers



Thanks, I called him, he says he gets them at 22 weeks old and keeps them for 42 weeks, eggs go to pullet farms, and commercial bakeries, I misunderstood him before,  so the liter at the pullet farm would be from 22 weeks, and his liter would be 42 weeks , according to his operation.


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## Mudfeather (Mar 28, 2015)

There is another piece of the puzzle that warrants real study.....The GMO altered seeds that are fed to our food now.....

You realize that a field of GMO standing grain is considered a pesticide until it is harvested....then it is considered food....

Their are country's around the world that are telling Monsanto that they are not allowing that mess in their country....but the US is....

GMO stuff is being linked to all kinds of issues in humans....God only knows the impact it is having before it gets to us...That could explain why chicken litter is different today than in past years???

just one for instance...


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## warmouth (Mar 28, 2015)

Is this disease harmful to us if we eat the bird? That one picture posted with the warts on the turkey head was gross and I would question if it were safe to eat. I had blackhead wipe out my pen farmed quail several years ago. Lost my whole flock.


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## Throwback (Mar 28, 2015)

weve spread broiler litter for 25 years. the only time we saw a turkey population decline was when three of the surrounding neighbors clear cut their land and replanted in pines in the same year. im talking about several hundred acres total. they roosted on their timber property and fed on our pastures. 

im quite sure that our weed problem comes either from the litter or the trucks that spread it though.  


T


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## oyster (Mar 29, 2015)

I saw this post the other day, and recently checked our cameras and had this picture of a hen with something strange going on with her head.


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