PATNA: Poultry farmers in Bihar are afraid of resurgence of bird flu amid Covid-19, after a sample collected from Nawada district recently tested positive for avian influenza.The farmers are fearful also because it surfaced again after one month of the last two positive cases reported on March 26 from Ashok Nagar (Kankarbagh) in Patna and Saidpur under Katarisarai block in Nalanda district.Bihar has around 1,200 big and medium-sized poultry farms. Besides, the state also has more than 2,000 backyard poultry farms where 10 to 100 chickens are kept, an agriculture department official said.According to a state’s animal and fisheries resources department (AFRD) data, six samples collected from different places in March were tested positive for bird flu. The first bird flu case this year was reported from Kankarbagh on March 6. Three other positive samples were reported from Saidpur, Patna high court area and Bazar Samiti in the state capital on March 17. Again on March 26, two more bird flu cases were reported from Patna and Nalanda districts.“The bird flu cases in Nawada’s Rajhat village and subsequent culling of 9,000 hens of the private farm has sent a shock wave among the poultry farmers,” said Rahul Kumar, who runs a poultry farm near Koelwar in Bhojpur district. “We are now taking preventive measures as suggested by the state government to save our chickens,” said Rabindra Sharma, another farm owner.Taking the Nawada case seriously, the AFRD has asked its district animal husbandry officers to collect samples from all poultry farms to ensure timely detection of bird flu.“The department is alert. All district and division level officers have been asked to maintain close vigil on poultry farms. The department has so far collected 1,841 samples as a preventive measures and sent them to lab at Kolkata and Bhopal,” state agriculture, animal and fishery resources minister Prem Kumar told TOI on Friday.He said the poultry farmers do not need to be panicky as the state government has taken all preventive measures to check bird flu.