Over 3,500 ducks die in TN, test rules out disease outbreak

Over 3,500 ducks owned by a poultry farmer died in a nearby village, after consuming suspected polluted water on the Palar riverbed. But the tests have ruled out any outbreak of a disease for the en-masse deaths of the birds, a top official said here on Friday.

Gopinath, a poultry farmer, had been rearing 3,500 ducks at nearby Periya Komeswaram village. The birds were found dead in bunches on June 13 and 14.

“The ducks had drunk water stagnant on some stretches of the Palar riverbed. We suspect the water might have been heavily contaminated and toxic,” said a top district animal husbandry official, who did not wish to be named. He said tests carried out to ascertain if the ducks had died of any disease outbreak had confirmed that it was not so.

“Test result today confirmed that the deaths are not due to any disease outbreak. It was not due to any disease that affects birds (including ducks)," he said. “The poultry farmer has 1,000 more ducks and these are reared in a separate enclosure by him. These birds are confined to the enclosure and have not been affected,” he said.

He said only those ducks that drank water from the riverbed had died. To a question, he said “such deaths happen when the level of toxicity in the water goes beyond a particular level.”