Infected birds inhabit S.F. Zoo’s new exhibit - Event Date: June 16 2006

At least five parakeets in the flock at Binnowee Landing, the San Francisco Zoo's new blockbuster exhibit, have tested positive for a disease that is highly contagious and often fatal to other members of the avian community -- including family pets -- according to an internal memo sent by the head veterinarian the day before the show opened.

Bird lovers are worried and furious.

The ailment, which cannot be transmitted to humans, is called psittacine beak and feather disease. The zoo knew about the problem before importing the creatures but decided to go ahead with the heavily promoted June 8 opening of the interactive exhibit, in which birds in a walk-in aviary land on visitors who lure them with millet-coated feed sticks.

Zoo officials say there's nothing to fret about.

"We've done exhaustive risk analysis for this," said Bob Jenkins, director of animal care and conservation at the zoo. "There's no reason for anyone to be fearful of this exhibit."

Alarmed bird owners disagree. Dani Eurynome of Oakland, who has seven psittacines and runs a holistic parrot supply store on the Web, said she, for one, won't be going to Binnowee Landing.

"I was delighted at the existence of the new exhibit and had planned on visiting," Eurynome said via e-mail. "However, after learning the news ... I do not plan on coming."

Michelle Hawkins, a veterinarian, avian specialist and assistant professor at the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine, said the disease needs to be taken seriously.

"If you have a closed flock, and you're aware you have disease, you have to assume your entire flock could be infected," she said. "It's going to be very difficult to know who's positive and who's negative."

Any member of the psittacine family -- such as parrots, conures or macaws -- can contract the virus, which is hardy and difficult to eradicate, she said.

Ironically, this means that the very interaction the zoo is advertising for Binnowee Landing could spread the disease and that bird fans who normally would flock to it might stay away. It also means that the aviary must remain empty for at least six months after the Australian birds leave at the end of October, said head veterinarian Freeland Dunker, author of the memo, who ordered the tests.

"The disease is passed through the birds' feathered down," Hawkins said. "That particulate matter is very fine. It can settle into the environment or be wafted into the air. If it's an open-air aviary, the potential for particles to move outside the cage could happen."

As a result, the zoo's own psittacine birds could be at risk. The zoo is downplaying the likelihood, saying that the public has no direct contact with those birds and that they are adults, less likely to get the virus than their younger counterparts are.

Moreover, the five infected parakeets are still on display and have not been isolated from the rest of the flock, even though quarantining such birds is routine. The veterinarian at Living Exhibits Inc., the San Diego company that is renting the traveling show to the zoo, wanted it that way, Dunker said in a phone interview.

"That was their choice," he said. "In this case, they thought it was kind of like closing the door after the flock leaves."

Dunker said that 10 percent of each bird group in the 607-member flock -- 502 grass parakeets, 88 cockatiels and 17 eastern rosellas -- was tested. The findings were reported on May 11, two weeks before the birds arrived in San Francisco. Besides the five infected parakeets, three others had "questionable" results.

"Testing 10 percent gives you a good evaluation of the flock as a whole," Hawkins said.

Hand sanitizers were installed at the entrance and exit to the exhibit. A day after it opened, a wordy sign was erected that includes this sentence: "If anyone has a parrot, parakeet or similar bird at home that is not feeling well today, we would ask that you not enter the exhibit today."

The sign offers no explanation and does not mention the disease, which attacks a bird's immune system and causes abnormal feather growth and beak deformities.

During an hourlong visit to the zoo Tuesday afternoon, a Chronicle reporter did not see one person read the sign from start to finish. Most visitors ignored it completely. Jenkins said employees also give verbal warnings. They didn't do that on Tuesday.

When the reporter, who did not identify herself as a member of the media, asked two zoo workers about the sign as they collected $2 admission fees and sold $1 feed sticks, one said: "It's so your birds don't make our birds sick."

"Can your birds make my bird sick?" inquired the reporter, who does not actually have a bird.

"No."

Inside the aviary, a Living Exhibits employee was asked whether any birds in the exhibit were sick.

"None of my birds have anything," she replied. "They're tested all the time."

The sign implies that only visitors with ailing birds should bypass the exhibit. But any infected residents of Binnowee -- an Aboriginal word that means "place of many birds" -- could make healthy pet birds sick, Hawkins said.

Noting that there is a difference between infection and clinical disease, Hawkins said it's possible a bird "could shed the virus and not show clinical signs," such as tattered feathers or a brittle beak.

"We do assume a positive could shed at any point," she said.

Zoo official Jenkins said exhibit visitors who own psittacines should have no trouble -- as long as they sanitize their hands before and after visiting the zoo birds, clean their shoes, shower thoroughly and wash their clothes and hair.

Ambitious as such a regimen might seem, bird owners say even that is not enough. They point out that the virus is transmitted through fine particles, which could end up anywhere.

Dunker's memo is circulating on Internet bird forums, and people are squawking. Among the comments:

"Don't think I would want to step foot in that zoo. You could be standing next to someone that was in the exhibit."

"That is terrible! You would think they would shut it down or something!"

"This is so hard to believe that they do not let the public know."

The "general biosecurity warning," as Dunker describes it, was issued on June 9. At the opening the day before, nothing was said to the crowd, despite the fact that Dunker's cautious three-page memo had been sent to all zoo employees on June 7.

"It would have been good to know in advance," said San Francisco resident Christine Gilmour, whose 5-year-son, Jackson, was one of 18 kindergartners at the opening. "I think the zoo should be fairly accountable in letting families know."

San Francisco Supervisor Gerardo Sandoval, who doesn't own birds but visited the exhibit on opening day with his 3-year-old daughter, Natalie, said signs need to be made much more obvious.

"In their efforts to make the zoo an exciting and fun place, management may have inadvertently created a small risk for pet birds kept at home," Sandoval said. "I'm sure they'll implement corrective measures."

Who gets it: Parrots known to be particularly affected include: cockatoos, macaws, African grays, ringneck parakeets, Eclectus parrots, lovebirds.

What it does: Causes fatal infections, primarily in young birds.

How it's transmitted: Transmission is primarily through direct contact, inhalation or ingestion of aerosols, crop-feeding, infected fecal material and feather dust. Also via contaminated surfaces such as bird carriers, feeding formula, utensils, food dishes, clothing and nesting materials.

Symptoms: Include irreversible loss of feathers, shedding of developing feathers, development of abnormal feathers, new pinched feathers, loss of powder down, overgrown or abnormal beak.

Treatment: No known treatment.

Source: AvianBiotech.com