Please Help, Confirmed Marek's and Mycoplasma

[Jasfarm]

I'm sorry to hear the sad news.

Neither Marek's nor Mycoplasma are really a death sentence.
Yes, some do end up having to cull the sickest of their birds to release them from their suffering, but many folks learn to manage symptoms as they appear.

If you do have MG in your flock, then look into giving Denagard (Tiamulin) for 3 days each month as a maintenance to help control symptoms. There's a lot of older threads here on BYC discussing Tiamulin, so look them up and study them over.

Lot of people here on BYC with Marek's too. Again, culling very sick individual birds may be needed, but you would have to make that determination.

Do provide fresh food, fresh water, grit, limit treats to no more than 10% of daily intake, etc. Check for lice/mites and get a fecal float to see if periodic deworming is needed, if not then I would deworm twice a year. Check to make sure crops are emptying.
Any symptoms you see, start offering extra supportive care to give them a boost.

Keep a closed flock or if you do add new birds, then know that they will be exposed. Your flock is carriers. Some would recommend getting vaccinated birds - again, that's up to you, do your research on that as well.

I'm sure it's been heartbreaking to go through all this. I hope in time things begin to get better as you start to manage symptoms.

This is so helpful! Thank you! It breaks my heart seeing the option of just culling your whole flock. I get it but it still makes me sad

 

[orelsi]

I've great success treating mycoplasma with oxytetracycline antibiotics. They are pretty safe when it comes to side effects as well.

 

[cubalaya]

I'm confused. You already know what your flock has/ been exposed to. Killing one just to do another necropsy will not gain anything. The way I see it, you have 2 choices. Euthanize everybody right now, clean and disinfect your premises, wait an appropriate amount of time, and start over again, OR euthanize any bird obviously suffering, and let the rest live their life, and keep a closed flock. Chickens, like all birds, hide their illness until they are really sick. It's unlikely that you missed it in the first bird, and unlikely that killing a "healthy looking," or slightly off bird will gain you anything more. I'm sorry that you are going through this, it can be upsetting to lose them.

I would cull everything and start over