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Poultry litter
Poultry litter is the mix of bedding material, manure and feathers that result from intensive poultry production. This includes litter from meat chickens (broilers), egg-laying chickens (layers) kept under barn conditions, turkeys, ducks and quails. Poultry bedding material consists of wood shavings, pine straw, peanut hulls, and other absorbent dry low-cost materials and is another possible source of pathogenic contamination for poultry. It is generally recommended that farmers keep litter as dry as possible, replace the top layer of the litter with a new one, and apply acid-based litter amendments. Keeping litter dry is a critical part of overall management on every poultry farm. Litter conditions influence bird performance, which in turn affects profits of growers and integrators. Dry litter helps control ammonia levels, provides a healthy flock environment, and reduces condemnations due to hock and footpad burns and breast blisters.
What is litter? Litter and its management are an essential part of bird management and ensuring bird welfare. This goes for broilers, turkeys, or laying hens kept on litter floors. Litter is a combination of the bedding used within a house combined with the excreta from the birds. Good quality litter provides...
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Sudipto Haldar (Research Director at Agrivet) talks about eubiosis, dysbiosis and digestibility, as well as the role of enzymes, probiotics and phytogenics, in this Engormix interview....
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January 28, 2025
United States - Georgia - Atlanta
Ben Parsons (University of Arkansas) speaks on the cost and environmental implications of phosphorus requirements and explains the steps forward shown in his recent research, in this Engormix interview during IPPE 2024 in Atlanta, USA....
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I. INTRODUCTION To successfully develop a challenge model to simulate actual infection as seen in production practices, a seeder challenge model was proposed and previously shown to be an effective method to infect poultry (Cox et al., 1996, 2020). However, applying it in this way to young layers is novel. This pilot study was developed with the objective of determining the success of this challenge method. A second objective was to determine the base line effectiveness of the...
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You are frying eggs for breakfast. You get distracted and the next thing you know your eggs are burning and your kitchen is filling with smoke. What do you do first? Open the window to get rid of the smoke or remove the skillet from the stove to stop the generation of the smoke? You of course, remove the skillet from the stove, then open windows because opening the windows in itself doesn't solve the problem, because your eggs are still burning and filling the kitchen with...
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I. INTRODUCTION The quality of poultry feed and litter are important for maintaining and improving poultry production. Poultry feed (raw materials and formulated diet) is highly variable and large safety margins are needed to buffer the nutritional variability in feed ingredients when formulating diets (Moss et al., 2021). Feed ingredients delivered to feed mills are not comprehensively analysed using current methods (i.e., wet-chemistry and NIR). This is because the large quantities...
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INTRODUCTION The poultry industry in Brazil has gained worldwide prominence and has experienced a major evolution in the technological aspects related to the production of broilers. In 2016, Brazil produced 12.9 million tons of chicken meat, which ranked second in terms of world production (ABPA, 2017). According to the FAO, from 2000 to 2030, the world will have to increase the meat production by 20%, and the greatest potential growth will be in chicken meat...
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Introduction Brazilian agriculture is concentrated in the tropical and subtropical zone, where soils are highly weathered and chemically infertile, demanding amelioration by liming and high amounts of plant nutrient inputs (Cantarella et al., 1998). In Brazil, soybean is the main crop both in scale and in value, covering ~38 M ha with an average yield of 3.5 t ha−1 (Cattelan and Dall'Agnol, 2017; EMBRAPA, 2022). Annually, about 1.2 M t of P are required to produce...
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• As Biomass for generating Electricity
• As fertilizer for crop production
• Biogas production
• Compost improvement
• Feed in fish ponds
A substantial proportion of the litter or manure is estimated to be disposed of by...
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It is not uncommon to see weeds sprout after applying broiler litter to a field. As a result, it seems logical to conclude that there are weed seeds in the broiler litter. But, is this true? Poultry litter is not like cattle manure or the droppings from wild or backyard birds. Ruminant manure can contain seeds that pass through the...
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There are essentially two types of poultry house circulation fan systems: vertical and horizontal. In a vertical circulation fan system, fans are located in the center of the house, typically near the ceiling, and are oriented to blow straight down towards the floor. The air then moves across the floor, up the side walls, and back...
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Preventing injury to a chicken’s foot pads (paws) is very important for a number of reasons. First, chicken paws are a valuable product, a delicacy in some cultures, and often sell for as much as two to three times as breast meat on a per-pound basis. Secondly, foot pad lesions can become infected, resulting in leg problems and a decrease in overall bird performance. Last but not least, a chicken’s feet are a good indicator of litter quality. Numerous studies have documented the...
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Annelies Kers (Utrecht University) Knowledge of factors that influence the functioning of gut microbes is essential to improve health and reduce the use of antibiotics in poultry production. The environment, and more specifically housing conditions, can affect the gut microbiome of broiler chickens. The gut microbiome is defined as the collection of all the microorganisms and their “theatre of activity” in the gut environment. Previous...
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The Digital Evolution of the Poultry Industry: Imagine. Collaborate. Gain.
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Annelies Kers (Utrecht University) speaks on the relation between the gut microbiome of chickens and their environment, during the 11th Symposium on Gut Health in Production of Food Animals in St. Louis, USA....
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DESCRIPTION OF PROBLEM Avian coccidial disease, endemic across worldwide broiler production, and can be exacerbated by the reuse of litter should oocysts shed from previous flocks build up and sporulate in the current flock. Coccidial species can infect the gastrointestinal tract from the duodenum to the ceca resulting in localized tissue damage and reduced performance and without treatment, potentially result in morbidity and mortality (Chapman, 2014). The morbidity and mortality...
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1. Introduction Air emissions from concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs), are reported to cause health impacts for both the animals and humans exposed [1–3]. The concentration of fine particulate matter (PM 2.5 ) and gases emitted from CAFOs can have regional impacts on people living in the area around them [3–7]. More recent studies show that emissions from agricultural facilities can cause the nitrogen enrichment of soils and waterways [8]. While...
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1. Introduction Animal welfare is a fundamental component of sustainability, agricultural development and food security. In order for a livestock system to be sustainable, it should be sustainable economically, environmentally and ecologically, and at the same time, it should be accepted ethically and socially [1–3]. Today, a product of animal origin is not considered sustainable unless the social demand for welfare of the production animals is satisfied [1]. Animal...
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