AILSA CHANG, HOST:
Ducks and geese have started flying south for the winter. It makes for a pretty sight. But some are carrying sickness with them. The migration has caused an uptick in cases of bird flu in commercial chicken and turkey farms. Minnesota Public Radio's Dana Ferguson visited a turkey grower who's fending off the illness with a new approach.
DANA FERGUSON, BYLINE: On an overcast afternoon, Matt Herdering pulls out his cellphone as turkeys chatter in a nearby barn.
(SOUNDBITE OF TURKEYS GOBBLING)
FERGUSON: The turkey grower shows me an app that controls the laser projector affixed to the boxy barn's roof. During the day, it looks like a faint green light pointed wherever Herdering directs. At night, the bright green band beams up into the sky, then around nearby fields.
MATT HERDERING: Looked like something out of "Star Wars," yeah.
FERGUSON: I like the lightsaber reference (laughter).
HERDERING: Yes. That's what it reminds me of. I tell my kids that when we drive by.
FERGUSON: "Star Wars" but for protecting turkeys.
HERDERING: Yep.
FERGUSON: The lasers scare off birds flying overhead without hurting them. Ducks and geese try to avoid them. This is important because migrating birds can pass on the virus to commercial flocks through secretions or feces if they get too close. For growers like Herdering, that causes serious anxiety. He's had flocks get sick before. And Minnesota has had to kill millions of birds in the past to stop the spread.
HERDERING: It terrifies us. It's one of those things where every spring and every fall, we live in fear. And you walk outside and you look up and you see a flock of 200 geese flying overhead and you just hope today isn't the day.
FERGUSON: Airports also use the lasers to keep birds away. On the farm, they add a layer of biosecurity to prevent the virus from reaching Herdering's flocks.
HERDERING: When we've got healthy birds in that barn, we think of that barn as being clean. We know those birds are healthy. We know they're doing well. We want to keep the dirty outside world away from those clean birds.
FERGUSON: Herdering's business got a state grant last year and bought two lasers. They're roughly $20,000 each. So far, they haven't tracked new cases there, even though a flock nearby contracted the virus. Shauna Voss is with the Minnesota Board of Animal Health. She says the lasers are still new. There isn't much data yet on how effective they are, but anecdotal feedback has been positive.
SHAUNA VOSS: I know the producers that have installed those lasers. They're very expensive, but they've been really happy with them.
FERGUSON: GOP State Representative Paul Anderson co-chairs the Minnesota House Agriculture Committee. He says a tight budget could make it hard to continue the program, which got $400,000 over two years, but he supports it.
PAUL ANDERSON: We all like our Thanksgiving turkeys and whatever else, so we want to help keep Minnesota the top-producing state in the country, and this is one way to help show our support to do that.
FERGUSON: For more farmers armed with lasers, that could mean the Force - and not the bird flu - is with them. For NPR News, I'm Dana Ferguson in Melrose, Minnesota.
(SOUNDBITE OF 4FARGO'S "GET HER") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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