Avian flu kills dozens of Niverville geese

Warning: This story contains an image of a dead swan.

A Niverville resident is shocked to find several dead swans at the retention pond in his backyard – and has even spotted one on his back deck.

All of them were killed by the outbreak of avian flu.

Mason Goulet spotted a handful of Canada geese on the ice about three weeks ago, struggling to move.

“We thought maybe some of them were frozen in the snow,” Goulet said from his porch Thursday. “It turned out they were really sick.”

On November 13, the City of Niverville issued a statement advising residents that the Manitoba Conservation Branch had detected avian flu in the local goose population. This virus has already been found in nearby communities.

Lab tests have confirmed that it is H5 avian influenza virus. H5 circulates in wild bird populations. Subtype H5N1 is responsible for some human cases of the disease.

After being away for a few days, Goulet was shocked to find a dead swan on his veranda. He estimated that it was there for three to five days.

The conservation department had told them to leave it where it was, and that it could take another week to dispose of it.

Goulet said she and her neighbors are concerned about the swan population and the potential for other animals to get sick. He has seen eagles tearing at dead bodies.

“People have dogs walking around — they could potentially bite or do something, which obviously wouldn’t be good,” Goulet said.

“Our cat loves to go out on the deck, so we have this goose that’s forbidden to be touched right now, so we can’t let him out on the deck.”

Canadian Wildlife Services biologist Frank Baldwin said avian flu occurs naturally in waterfowl. He said, the immunity of the population decreases with time.

It’s unusual for the death rate to be so high in Manitoba, Baldwin said, because the virus typically peaks after swans migrate during the season.

Other parts of Canada, such as southern Ontario and Quebec, and some northern parts of the United States have seen similar death rates, Baldwin said. Those outbreaks coincide with cooler weather.

“When birds become highly concentrated, the virus spreads rapidly through the population,” Baldwin said.

“Birds also undergo some stress associated with cold weather, and that increases the mortality rate that we see here.”

Baldwin and wildlife technician Owen Andruschuk visited retention ponds in Niverville on Thursday to plan next steps.

The Canadian Wildlife Service worked with the provincial government and the city of Niverville to clean up the carcasses.

Baldwin later told CBC that a total of 165 bodies were removed Friday, including the swan on the deck.

The Public Health Agency of Canada considers the virus to be of low risk to humans, but Baldwin said some precautions still need to be taken.

Dead birds should not be handled and pets should be kept away from them. He advises hunters to always make sure they pick birds in open areas, wash their hands regularly and make sure the meat is thoroughly cooked.

“There’s also a risk to birds of prey like scavengers, things like bald eagles and some mammals that scavenge,” Baldwin said.

“There have been confirmed cases this fall in Manitoba of things like coyotes, otters, foxes that have been infected with the virus and died.”

There are active and serious outbreaks of avian flu in both wild and domestic poultry across Canada. More than 16 million domestic birds have died or been killed since December 2021.

Those numbers include 300 ostriches killed in B.C. last month and 63,000 birds in southwestern Ontario.

The only confirmed H5N1 human case that came from transmission within Canada last year was in B.C.

Hannah Wallace, a University of Manitoba researcher who specializes in emerging viruses and viral immunology, said most human cases are not found in the general population.

“The majority of people are working either on poultry farms or dairy farms,” ​​Wallace said.

“These are people who have been in close contact with infected animals for very long periods of time.”

Avian influenza is difficult to prevent in wild bird populations, Wallace said.

Samples from the birds will be sent to the Canadian Food Inspection Agency for DNA sequencing, Wallace said.