A new farm in Abbotsford, Canada has been placed under quarantine and more could be flagged in the coming days as the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) continues to monitor an outbreak of avian flu.

Twenty-three farms were initially under quarantine because they are within a three-kilometre radius of E & H farms, where government officials confirmed the presence of the virus, Saturday (May 8).

But CFIA disease control specialist Sandra Stephens said an additional property has been added to the list because it's been determined there was "significant contact" between it and the affected property.

"We're still working on tracing movement to and from the infected premises," Stephens said Tuesday (May 11). "So as we're working our way through those, we may identify others that will need to be placed under quarantine," she added.

Stephens said the quarantined barns will be tested for the presence of the virus for at least three weeks.

"So far, we're all negative on all the other tests that we have done. The last of the 60,000 turkeys at the infected property were slated to be killed with carbon dioxide gas," she said.

The bodies will be composted inside the barns and monitored to ensure the virus is rendered inactive. After 7-10 days, the carcasses will be removed from the barn to complete the composting process.

Meanwhile, she said testing continues at a CFIA laboratory to confirm the pathogenicity, sub-type and strain of the virus. Those results should be known within days.

In 2004, an outbreak of avian influenza led to the killing of 17 million birds in British Columbia, the largest animal cull in Canadian history.