Par
Emma Grivotte
Published on
Jan 7, 2025 at 5:53 p.m.
For the Houssaye Farmin Eure, hit hard by avian flu, it’s “a big blow”, confides Donatien Lavignethe manager of this family farm: “We shave all your animals for which you get up in the morning, the fruit of your work. »
Known for its duck breeding and its slaughterhouse in Épaignes, where its small shop stocked with fresh meat, canned cooked meals and poultry terrines, the company which employs around sixty people will idle.
There is nothing left. We lost all our work for the last four months, and our livelihood for the next four months.
First 23,000 chickens and guinea fowl
The catastrophe begins within its large chicken and guinea fowl breeding site located in La Poterie-Mathieu.
The breeder Donatien Lavigne alerted the State services because he noticed a unusual mortality in a building, i.e. a loss of 10% in 6 days (representing 300 heads out of the 23,000 on the site). “It's not much, but it's enough. »
Friday December 27, 2024, samples are taken from the animals and confirm the presence of the pathogen : “Of the 20 swabs taken, 20 were positive for avian influenza. »
The next day, the 23,000 poultry on the site, in all buildings, were slaughtered. In detail, 15,000 chickens and 8,000 guinea fowl.
As part of measures to combat the spread of the virus, an operation to depopulate poultry from the farm concerned was carried out, as well as an initial cleaning and disinfection operation.
An area under surveillance within a 10 km radius
State services establish regulated zones, protection 3 km around the outbreak, and surveillance between 3 and 10 km around the outbreak. 54 municipalities are currently affected by restrictions prohibiting, for example, the movements of poultry, without exemption from the DDPP (Departmental Directorate for Population Protection), and requiring owners to shelter their poultry and birds. The zones can only be lifted in fifteen days to a month if the epidemic proves to be under control.
But how were the poultry contaminated? “In any case, the source of the problem is migratory birds. Maybe we will never know where it comes from,” replies Donatien Lavigne.
The virus could have entered because of an infected pigeon or gull, when animals were still allowed to roam outdoors before mid-November or afterwards, or even through exchanges with other farms.
Moreover, other cases of avian flu were identified in a smaller farm of 559 heads in Équemauville (Calvados), which the Ferme de la Houssaye had supplied with poultry. It was also depopulated.
Ducks also killed
But the disaster was not over for the Lavigne family. After analyzes carried out on the other site of the Farm in Épaignes,8,000 ducks were also killed Tuesday, December 31, then cremated at the knacker's, bringing the total to the dizzying figure of 31,000.
Donatien Lavigne grumbles a little at this decision. Particularly because of rpoorly referenced laboratory analysis results. Of the 360 samples taken, there were only 2 positive tests on stool samples.
“Doubts about the traceability” of samples
However, “positive results are not associated with a correct breeding building, because it is said that they come from a building that is empty. SO, I have a few doubts about the traceability of the swabs and analyses. »
The sampling date did not correspond to the actual date either, and the slaughter teams from Bordeaux had been staying at the hotel since Saturday, ready to intervene.
“Is this bad report of lab notes?” » asks Donatien Lavigne, who, despite his fear of having been a victim of the zeal of the administration, understands that it respects a “precautionary principle”.
Since Friday December 27, those in charge of the DDPP* have been telling me that the ducks were going to pass anyway. They only have one fear, that it will explode and be everywhere, and that it will be said that the problem was poorly managed by their department.
Vaccination “does not prevent contamination”
Although his ducks were vaccinated following national obligation since October 2023they could be healthy carriers and transmit the virus to other livestock.
The Eure prefecture indicates in another press release: “Vaccination limits the spread of the disease since it reduces excretion, and thus collectively protects a territory, but she does not prevent individual contamination and more limited circulation within a farm. A large series of samples was taken at the Épaignes farm, for virological analyses, in order to provide all available means to detect the virus or traces of its passage. Faced with converging elements and to prevent any risk of spreading the virus, preventive depopulation of the animals present on the Épaignes site was carried out. »
2 million euros loss
This massacre will represent big economic losses. To prevent the spread of the virus, slaughtered animals are not recycled, although avian influenza is not found in meat.
“The compensation provided on the animals killed corresponds only to what they cost before we came to slaughter them: the price of the duckling, a little gas and the feed,” explains the young breeder.
“It doesn’t give me what I could have earned” once the meat has been processed, does not repay the loans, nor does it compensate for the “crawl space” imposed on the farm for three months. Result :
We should lose 30% of turnover. Out of 6 million, we will lose 2 million euros.
“Getting up from this hard blow”
A stumble on a previously promising journey. Since he took the reins alongside his father Franck Lavigne, in 2016the farm “makes on average 10% more turnover every year”, assures the farmer.
“It’s a successful business, we also employ 10% more staff every year. We arrive at 60 people compared to 27 when I arrived. »
Also, Donatien Lavigne assures us: “It’s a company that will recover from this hard blow. »
For employees, Ferme de la Houssaye does not plan no technical unemployment. After the end-of-year celebrations and in particular the production of foie gras, “there is lots of time off to take ».
Livestock workers will have “washing” to do “for days and days” to continue disinfection of the buildings.
The store remains open
To run its slaughterhouse and its processing workshop, the operation had the support from another breeder from whom she buys the chicken, in order, among other things, to “provide work for the 40 to 50 employees”. The same goes for duck with Ferme du Mont Crocq, in Toutainville.
The Épaignes store remains open. Its products can be consumed without worry. The batch of contaminated guinea fowl had been separated for six days, “and even if a poultry had the beginnings of avian flu infection, there are no repercussions on meat or offal because the virus does not pass into the muscles and is very vulnerable to heat,” reassures Donatien Lavigne.
It is therefore still possible to taste your local duck confit until production restarts!
* Departmental Directorate of Population Protection
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