Long Island farm hatches thousands of new chicks after culling nearly 100K due to avian flu

A duck farm on Long Island has hatched a new generation of chicks — beginning to replace the nearly 100,000 mallards they were forced to kill due to the spread of avian flu.Crescent Duck Farm in Aquebogue welcomed 3,700 new chicks just over a month after farm operators were forced to cull 99,000 ducks when an outbreak of H1N5 — bird flu — spread across the susceptible flock.About half of the newborn birds are female — with hens beginning to lay their own eggs at the age of six months.New York state had sanitized 15,000 eggs from Crescent Duck Farm at an off-site hatchery, though discarded as many as 6,000 which did not have growing embryos, Riverhead Local reported.Of the 9,000 eggs salvaged, only 3,700 hatched, a considerably low percentage that disappointed the farm’s ownership.“As a farmer, I was hoping for better,” Crescent Duck Farm president James Corwin told the outlet.Corwin added that if another outbreak of bird flu occurs on the Long Island farm, “we’re done.”“The administration is going to have to do something for the egg industry,” Corwin opined to the outlet.However, Corwin, like many poultry farmers, said he is opposed to vaccinating birds against H1N5 — something that is currently not allowed by the USDA.Overseas trading partners will also not accept chickens that have been vaccinated, according to CNN.Animal medicine company Zoetis has secured a conditional green light from the Trump administration to pursue an H1N5 vaccine with the blessing of the USDA’s National Veterinary Stockpile.The outbreak of H1N5, which began back in 2022, has not only affected ducks, but has decimated flocks of chickens, turkeys and geese across the US.Avian flu killed 40 million laying hens in 2024, according to Egg-News.com.That includes in California, where 52% of laying hens have died since January 2024 — bringing the total population of egg-bearers to just 4.4-million in the state.In an attempt to thwart the progress of the virus, 27 mill...