Romanian villages tackle bird flu

A freshening wind and steady rain pound the olive green waters of the Danube delta. Flocks of swans flap heavily through a grey sky.

On the banks of the river, white and grey geese waddle as usual, but the villagers are wary of each passing boat. Police and border guard launches speed to and fro.

This is an area blighted by avian flu. There are confirmed cases in three villages, and several other suspicious cases of dead birds are under investigation.

"I never thought it would come to this," said Lefter Chirica, the government appointed official responsible for Tulcea County.

"It's like a science fiction film - men in strange overalls, walking through our villages."

New measures

The men are from the local veterinary authority, collecting geese, ducks and hens for slaughter in the villages of Maliuc and Vulturu, and disinfecting the yards of houses and even the muddy lanes of the villages.

As we approach the two villages in a hired boat, a police boat appears from nowhere, ordering us to turn back.

When we explain that we have no intention of landing in the quarantined area, we are reluctantly allowed to proceed - under escort.

The village of Gorgova is only 5km (three miles) downstream from Maliuc. At the main landing stage, we must walk through a white solution that disinfects our feet.

Despite the rain, and the horror of the threat they are facing, villagers welcome us to their homes.

In their beautifully kept garden and yard, Florica and Stella have draped nets over their chicken run, to try to keep wild birds away.

Precautionary measures announced by the Romanian authorities in the past days emphasise trying to establish barriers between the domestic and wild birds throughout the delta region.

Florica doubts it can be done.

"We do not know what will happen now," she said. "What about the wild birds? They are the ones which will transmit the disease."

Thirty of Stella's birds died of an as yet inexplicable illness last month - 10 chickens and 20 chicks.

She burnt them and buried them in the neighbouring field.

Now, all birds which are found dead, domestic or wild, must be reported to the authorities, who take them swiftly away to laboratories for testing.

Easily spread

As surveillance is stepped up, more and more dead birds are found. But before the complicated testing process is complete, no-one can say whether bird-flu, or other reasons are to blame.

"Our swans are particularly vulnerable at the moment," said Eugen Petrescu, head of the Tulcea branch of the Romanian Ornithological Society.

Heavy rains in the summer left the water levels higher than usual, making it harder for swans, which cannot dive, to find food.

Swans favour water between 1-2m deep.

They and other birds, both domestic and wild, concentrate in areas where the waters are shallow, and they are unlikely to be disturbed - like the fish farm behind Maliuc, where 86 dead swans have been found in the last week alone.

The problem is that where birds gather together, the virus can spread more easily, and cross from wild birds, arriving from Asia, to domestic swans, geese, ducks and hens.

Several hundred white breasted geese have already arrived from Siberia in the delta region.

Hundreds of thousands more are expected in the next 10 days.

According to Eugen Petrescu, their behaviour is then quite unpredictable.

They will forage far inland for maize, wheat, and barley. Then depending on the severity of the winter, may either stay in Romania, or set off for warmer climes further south.