Contaminated eggs may be related to stress incurred from molting. Feed withdrawal to induce molting and stimulate egg-laying cycles in hens increases disease infection. An approach is needed that avoids disruption in the gastrointestinal tract.
Mycotoxins have been known to make animals more susceptible to disease. Environmental conditions, time of harvest and storage conditions all contribute to the disease.
Microflora in the animals' intestine play an important role in removing pathogens and its population depends on the balance between communities of organisms.
Antibiotics as a means of controlling gut diseases in poultry has come under pressure from consumers and legislators. An alternative would be to control the gut environment by selectively keeping out pathogens using a mix of substances such as probiotics and organic acids.
The addition of a pure form of betaine, a naturally occurring plant extract, to broiler breeder diets was allowing producers in Egypt to reduce the adverse effects of heat stress and improve the economic performance of their breeder flocks. One such example was El-Shrouk Mansoura, a producer with approximately 200,000 broiler breeders producing about 31 million eggs a year and located in the El-Mansoura area 120 kilometres north-east of Cairo.
Drinking water has a large impact on the health status and performance of farm animals. Water is indeed the most important nutrient and healthy animals drink twice as much water than they eat solid feed. Water intake is even higher when temperature rises.
AvicheckTM Corn, a unique analytical service that helps to maximise the nutritional and financial value of corn (maize), is enabling feed manufacturers and poultry producers throughout the world to optimise enzyme use, improve production uniformity and maximise financial margins. According to Danisco Animal Nutrition, which supplies the service, the benefits currently equate to as much as a US$12/tonne reduction in broiler feed costs.
New-generation phytase products will have an increasing and vital role in helping poultry producers stay ahead of economic pressures and tighter environmental standards by reducing feed costs and minimising phosphorus waste. However, to maximise the potential benefits, nutritionists must fully appreciate and account for the greater efficacy over traditional phytases when formulating poultry diets.
The potential of organic acids in feed preservation, protecting feed from microbial and fungal destruction, but also directly in the animal nutrition is already known for decades and was proven in uncounted laboratory and field trials. However, the knowledge of effects from synergistically acting organic acid blends of high biological value together with organic or inorganic physiologically active carriers to the animal is relatively new.
Scientists may need to re-examine assumptions about the spread of antibiotic-resistant genes, according to a new study by researchers at the University of Georgia. They found that poultry litter - a ubiquitous part of large broiler operations - harbors a vastly larger number of microbial agents that collect and express resistance genes than was previously known...
