Spring fieldwork may have aided bird flu outbreak

April and May saw very strong winds while farmers worked their fields
Editor’s note: Information for this story is from Minnesota Public Radio and the Swift County Monitor-News.
Farmers who actively tilled fields near turkey barns in the early days of Minnesota’s avian influenza outbreak last year may have unwittingly helped spread the virus, a new University of Minnesota study says.
Soil in those fields may have been contaminated with droppings from migrating birds believed to be a source of the highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI.) The virus can survive cold temperatures in soil and tilling may have created “airborne particles that could carry the virus,” the university’s Center for Animal Health and Food Safety said in the report posted Thursday.
For more, subscribe to the Swift County Monitor-News print edition or our PDF internet edition. Call 320-843-4111 and you can get all the local news and sports delivered to you.