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Poultry behavior
Knowledge of the behaviour of the stock and the application of that knowledge in the care of the stock plays an important part in the maximisation of production efficiency of a poultry production enterprise. In addition, the management of the domestic fowl has received considerable attention over recent years from the community, particularly animal liberation groups, because of the way that commercial poultry management systems have intensified. As a consequence, the study of poultry behaviour is important to the unit manager, not only to ensure that the welfare of the birds and production efficiency are maintained but also to minimise the influence of what is often uninformed debate. Behaviour is the way that animals respond to the different stimuli they encounter in their environment. The stimuli may be from other birds, their environment, people or any other thing or occurrence. Aggression and feather pecking or plucking are the two most common behavioral problems in chickens.
Our Technical Manager for Poultry, Andras Palla, discusses the effect of heat stress in poultry especially in laying hens. Understand how heat stress affects egg production and how to mitigate the effect of temperature related issues in the farm....
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Piling is an abnormal behavior commonly observed in commercial laying hen flocks. Piling occurs when birds crowd together, usually on top of one another, in a densely packed manner. A piling event may or may not end in smothering. Smothering occurs when one or more birds die due to suffocation from piling. Piling and...
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Will New Version of GMP Boost the Veterinary Drugs Industry?
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Human-animal interaction is the mutual and dynamic relationship between a human and an animal where the animal perceives human interaction as degree of relatedness or distance and vice-versa. Human beings have domesticated poultry species for eggs and meat production. Domestication has favored tameness in animals, however,...
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American and European companies are pledging to move to include slow-growing broiler chickens for production, which means they will use broiler chickens with less efficient growth rates in their production systems. Slow-growing strains show improved welfare outcomes compared to conventional ones. This newsletter...
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The poultry husbandry landscape in the United States is rapidly evolving in response to public concern related to animal welfare. As the production systems become complex and the flock sizes increase, conventional welfare assessment methods can be inadequate. Technology can help us in that regard by reliably...
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In the summer season, as the temperature increases, poultry suffers from the condition called heat stress, also known as summer stress. This is a condition of imbalance between heat generation and heat loss in the body. This condition not only brings poor performance in birds but is also...
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Allowing poultry access to vegetated, woody spaces will benefit poultry welfare. One system that incorporates the production of vegetation and livestock, including poultry, is called a silvopasture system. Woody vegetation can provide a source of income for producers while providing preferred habitat for chickens. Silvopasture...
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Laying hens are female chickens raised for egg production. The egg production system in the US is currently undergoing a transition from conventional cages to cage-free housing systems. The number of cage-free housing has increased from 4% hens in 2004 to 28% at the end of 2020 (USDA-NASS, 2021). Cage-free systems provide space...
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Introduction Several factors can influence animal production, which can be beneficial or harmful to each species. In addition to the ambience, nutrition and sanity, the genetic characteristics of the breeds/lineages also cause changes in the adaptation and performance of the animals (Azevedo, Fosse Filho, Pereira, Andrade, & Júnior, 2016). In the current market there are three genetic groups of poultry according to their ability to produce: heavy poultry, light laying...
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I. INTRODUCTION In accepting the invitation to present a paper on laying hen welfare at APSS 2021, I thought that I would provide an overview of a special issue of Animal Production Science on layer hen welfare that will be published in early 2021. This special issue consists of 19 review papers on the welfare implications of: the production system; development, growth and production; husbandry and behaviour; and health. I had planned to report on the main findings of the...
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Identifying individual birds that are suffering or that have compromised health and welfare is key to maintaining high standards of poultry care. Knowing your birds and when they are ill or in pain is imperative for identifying birds that need treatment or that might need to be euthanized....
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Compromised leg health is a welfare and economic concern for meat chickens. Enrichment of the production environment via the provision of perches has been a focal point of research into reducing the prevalence of leg disorders in recent years. Despite inconsistent evidence of the effect of perches (Groves and Muir 2013; Phibbs et al. 2019), they are provided in almost two thirds of the Australian meat chicken industry, with 2.7 m perch/1000 birds required under the RSPCA Approved Farming...
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In 2020, the poultry industry had a combined value of over $35.5 billion in the United States. Of that, $21.7 billion came from broiler chicken production (USDA-NASS, 2021). Over 9.22 billion broiler chickens were raised and brought to market though the year, making it the largest and most valuable sector of U.S. poultry production. With such...
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Sickness behavior is an animal’s adaptive response to disease which aids in their recovery. When an animal is infected by a pathogen, an immune response involving immune cell and immune molecule activity is stimulated and sickness behavior results. Sick chickens are difficult to identify because they rarely show signs of illness before it...
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Innovative Directions in Aflatoxin Testing Point to Measureable Gains in Quality Of Lab Data
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The Poultry Extension Collaborative (PEC) brings you the webinar "Bugs, Biome and Breeding: Improving Laying Hen Welfare" on May 17th, from 9 to 12 am EST, via Zoom.
Attendance is free and you can register ...
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Chickens make different sounds for a plethora of reasons. Determining the reasons behind vocalizations and understanding how chickens use them is a great way to gain insight about their behavior. Some of the most common chicken vocalizations are: A rooster's crow A hen's "food call" Alarm calls A hen's post laying...
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Environmental factors encountered during pre-natal life influence the developmental trajectory of a developing embryo, altering post-natal phenotypes (Du et al., 2015). Maternal nutrition and stress directly influence the maternal environment, with both factors prominent in the broiler breeder industry. Broiler breeders are feed restricted to improve reproductive output; however evidence suggests hens suffer from chronic stress due to prolonged hunger (Mench, 2002). Feed restriction in...
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1. Introduction Contact dermatitis is an inflammation and irritation of the skin due to contact with an irritant or allergen. A common type of contact dermatitis in broiler chickens is footpad dermatitis (FPD), with necrotic lesions on the plantar surface of the central footpad [1]. When these lesions are left untreated, and environmental conditions remain the same or deteriorate, lesions will worsen, eventually encompassing the entire footpad, including the toes [2]. The...
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Will New Version of GMP Boost the Veterinary Drugs Industry?
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On-Farm Welfare Assessment: Laying Hens In this newsletter we will provide an overview of animal-based indicators that can be used to assess laying hen welfare on the farm, using measures from the Welfare Quality® Assessment protocol (2009). The...
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Identifying behavioral signs is key to managing heat stress in poultry Every year, high summer temperatures have important effects on poultry health and welfare. Heat stress occurs when poultry cannot adapt to high environmental temperatures and need to expend energy to...
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