The timing is a wake-up call. Two winters ago, when Sonoma County poultry farms were ravaged by the spread of avian influenza<\/a>, the first case didn\u2019t hit until around Thanksgiving.<\/p>\n The latest outbreak is another blow to the Reichardt family. Their Middle Two Rock Road farm was also heavily affected in 2023-24, when it was the first of multiple local facilities <\/a>infected by the deadly and highly virulent avian flu virus, which typically requires producers to destroy all of their birds on site.<\/p>\n Bird flu outbreaks hit flocks at nine other chicken, duck and egg-laying facilities in the county that season.<\/p>\n Phil Reichardt paused to talk to a reporter Tuesday\u00a0as his farm staff went about euthanizing 57,000 birds.<\/p>\n \u201cLook at the last six years now, with the DxE (animal liberation) raid<\/a>, COVID, bird flu in \u201923, now bird flu again in \u201925. My older sister passed in 2020,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s been hit after hit. We\u2019re looking for our fate to change at some point.\u201d<\/p>\n Reichardt Duck Farm is not to be confused with Liberty Ducks, a smaller Sonoma County\u00a0producer, owned by members of the same family but operating at a separate location.<\/p>\n The latest outbreak was detected after Reichardt Duck Farm staff noticed \u201ca modest increase in mortality\u201d \u2014 eight dead birds \u2014 in one of the barns last week, Phil Reichardt said. The next morning, there were a few more than that. They took a sample of birds to UC Davis for analysis, and received confirmation of Highly Pathogenic Avian Flu, or HPAI, on Oct. 24.<\/p>\n The duck farm began \u201cdepopulating\u201d its flock Sunday, borrowing some machinery from Weber Family Farms, an egg facility that also was forced to put birds to death in 2023-24. Phil Reichardt expected to finish the grim task Wednesday.<\/p>\n That\u2019s a departure from two years ago, when local ranchers knew much less about the spread of the pathogen and how best to block it.<\/p>\n In that previous round, Reichardt said, the farm received instructions from the U.S. Department of Agriculture the day before Thanksgiving. Because of the holiday, and a lower sense of urgency, they didn\u2019t begin depopulating for six days. This time, Reichardt expected to be done five days after confirmation, which he hoped would reduce the chances of the flu hopping to another facility.<\/p>\n \u201cThe industry, unfortunately, is getting very good at this,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n The report Thursday of another outbreak in one of the region\u2019s bird farms demonstrates the limitations of that quick action.<\/p>\n Rodrigo Gallardo, professor of poultry medicine at the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine and an expert in poultry RNA viruses, agreed.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s definitely a concerted effort,\u201d Gallardo said. \u201cThe California Department of Food and Agriculture usually helps with this, the USDA usually helps. We\u2019re all at high alert. We\u2019re approaching winter. And we have learned a lot of things about biosecurity and prevention. The hope is that we will reduce dissemination after one detection.\u201d<\/p>\n The recommendations on biosecurity measures haven\u2019t changed based on the new appearance of HPAI, said Sue Ostrom, Sonoma County\u2019s assistant agricultural commissioner, because \u2014 as Reichardt alluded \u2014 producers have gotten the work pretty buttoned down since their unprecedented local losses in the winter season two years ago.<\/p>\n \u201cOne thing that led to,\u201d Ostrom said, \u201cis that producers understand what needs to happen. How we dispose of carcasses, bedding and so forth. They can get to that faster now.\u201d<\/p>\n Christopher Chung \/ The Press Democrat<\/p>\n Workers remove dirt from a cage-free chicken house at a Weber Family Farms facility in Petaluma, in January 2024. The farm had to destroy 550,000 chickens and 3.2 million eggs after an avian flu outbreak. (Christopher Chung \/ The Press Democrat)<\/p>\n<\/li>\n Kent Porter \/ The Press Democrat file<\/p>\n Reichardt Duck Farm in the rolling hills of Two Rock, west of Petaluma, Friday, December 2023. (Kent Porter \/ The Press Democrat file)<\/p>\n<\/li>\n photo by John Burgess\/The Press Democrat<\/p>\n Law enforcement officers in riot gear wait to arrest animal welfare activists holding dead ducks they claim to have found inside the Reichardt Duck Farm on Middle Two Rock Road. (photo by John Burgess\/The Press Democrat)<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n Show Caption<\/p>\n Christopher Chung \/ The Press Democrat<\/p>\n 1 of 3<\/p>\n Workers remove dirt from a cage-free chicken house at a Weber Family Farms facility in Petaluma, in January 2024. The farm had to destroy 550,000 chickens and 3.2 million eggs after an avian flu outbreak. (Christopher Chung \/ The Press Democrat)<\/p>\n Expand<\/a><\/p>\n The strain of bird flu detected in recent tests at Reichardt Duck Farm is the same as the one that swept Sonoma County two years ago, resulting in the destruction of 1.2 million birds.<\/p>\n \u201cWe don\u2019t have any real smoking gun,\u201d Reichardt said. \u201cWe can only expect it was migratory birds flying overhead. We step into their droppings and enter the barns. We have foot pans in place, and we are careful to use them. But I guess we can\u2019t hit everywhere.\u201d<\/p>\n Like viruses transmitted among humans, HPAI tends to peak during the cold winter months. It generally spreads from migrating waterfowl to domesticated flocks along the major north-south flyways, including the Pacific Flyway that travels above Sonoma County. Researchers estimate 1 billion birds fly south along the Pacific Flyway each fall, and north again in the spring.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s normal, in a certain sense, to think cases will go up in the winter,\u201d Gallardo said. \u201cUsually, respiratory infections in chickens are related to changes in temperature and humidity. With birds migrating south, we\u2019re right at a time when this might happen.\u201d<\/p>\n While Reichardt Duck Farm was obligated to put down all of its birds, the business is not without prospects. Phil Reichardt estimated they have about 15,000 eggs currently incubating, and another 20,000-30,000 that are eligible to take that step soon. Those eggs must be moved off the property to raise elsewhere.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s an expensive process when no revenue is coming in,\u201d Reichardt said. \u201cBut it\u2019s all we know how to do. So we keep going even when it feels like we\u2019re battering our heads against a brick wall.\u201d<\/p>\n The Department of Agriculture has an indemnity program<\/a> that compensates poultry farmers for income lost to avian flu. In the 2023-24 outbreaks, affected Sonoma County farms received a total of $10.6 million.<\/p>\n Reichardt said he\u2019s appreciative of \u201canything that helps keep us afloat,\u201d but noted that he and the department are far apart in their estimation of fair market value for the ducks.<\/p>\n He also is hoping to open a discussion on USDA depopulation requirements. Because the flu is so highly transmissible, the federal agency insists on complete depopulation.<\/p>\n \u201cCould we have euthanized the affected birds and monitored the others? And continue testing birds?\u201d Reichardt wondered, noting that only a couple dozen were confirmed sick in the recent outbreak. \u201cI think I understand USDA\u2019s stance. This thing is terrible. When it takes hold, it\u2019s like a wildfire. But I think there are other methods to put out the wildfire. It\u2019s a depressing process to put down healthy, happy birds.\u201d<\/p>\n The duck farm must now wait four months before reintroducing birds, and it will takes months beyond that for young ducks to mature and become egg layers. Reichardt Duck Farm had yet to fully bounce back from late 2023, when the company was forced to euthanize more than 200,000 birds. The owner estimates that before getting the bad news last week, they were at about 40% of their pre-2023 levels.<\/p>\n Most depressing for Phil Reichardt is knowing there\u2019s a good chance the staff members who have been handling the depopulation may soon find their hours slashed, or could even be laid off as some were two winters ago.<\/p>\n \u201cIt really gets me emotional. Some of them are family to us,\u201d Reichardt said. \u201cThese people are working their butts off to put themselves out of work.\u201d<\/p>\n The first big California outbreak of 2023-24 was also in late October, at a turkey meat facility in Merced County. By the end of that winter, at least 6.3 million commercial birds had been killed in the state.\u00a0In Sonoma County alone, officials estimated the financial loss to producers at around $22 million. The effects were felt well beyond farm properties, with egg prices skyrocketing in stores<\/a>.<\/p>\n Last winter was far more devastating statewide, with more than 16.5 million dead birds. But that pandemic left Sonoma County unscathed. This winter already threatens to be different.<\/p>\n You can reach Phil Barber at 707-521-5263 or phil.barber@pressdemocrat.com. On X (Twitter) @Skinny_Post.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"California\u2019s first bird flu outbreaks of the 2025-26 winter season have hit close to home. The owner of…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":344430,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[147078,42340,16922,210,169455,169456,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-344429","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health","8":"tag-avian-flu","9":"tag-bird-flu","10":"tag-euthanasia","11":"tag-health","12":"tag-hpai","13":"tag-reichardt-duck-farm","14":"tag-united-states","15":"tag-unitedstates","16":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115466137711494783","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/344429","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=344429"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/344429\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/344430"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=344429"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=344429"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=344429"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n
\n
![\"Reichardt](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/ea7ae9c7-5470-5d06-8545-36e710f075b7.jpg\")
\n![\"Law](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/63373263-3937-466c-b073-2d3331343031.jpg\")
\n