Search Results (36)

Natural mating colony cages are crucial in poultry breeding, yet breed-specific management requires further investigation. We evaluated the effects of sex ratios, stocking densities, and cohabitation age on Lohmann Pink-shell breeders’ performance. A total of 6126 birds were randomly allocated to experimental groups with varying ratios (1:8–1:13), densities (582–748 cm²/bird), and cohabitation ages (120/140 days), each containing six replicates. We monitored male mating frequencies at 50 weeks in 1:8 and 1:10 ratio groups. All 120-day-old groups showed delayed production onset and superior male weight compliance (p < 0.01), with reduced egg breakage and increased healthy chick output (p < 0.01). Lower stocking densities (748/694 cm²/bird) showed lower breakage rate and uniformity than 582 cm²/bird (p < 0.05). The 1:10 sex ratio achieved optimal egg production and fertilization rate (p < 0.05). Male mating peaked between 16:00 and 18:00. Optimal parameters were 120-day age of cohabitation, 694 cm²/bird density, and 1:10 sex ratio, providing theoretical guidance for natural mating colony cage development in layer breeding. Full article

In the Gulf of California, seabirds carry heavy loads to feed their chicks, making their takeoff capacity crucial for foraging. While some studies explore this, few consider the lift force, induced power, or aerobic vs. anaerobic performance. Moreover, the differences between individuals—such as size or sex—remain largely unexamined, leaving gaps in the understanding of seabird flight efficiency. In this work, the load capacity during takeoff of the Least Storm-Petrel (LSP) and the Black Storm-Petrel (BSP) in Isla Partida Norte, Gulf of California, was analyzed. Forty-nine individuals of the Least Storm-Petrel group and 23 of the Black Storm-Petrel group were evaluated. In both species, the carrying capacity was found to be independent of individual size, but the Least Storm-Petrel managed to take off with a higher proportion of its total mass than the Black Storm-Petrel. Although smaller, LSPs lift more than BSPs, and environmental factors like El Niño also influence seabird performance. This study found that both storm-petrel species were smaller and lighter than previously reported; yet, LSPs carried relatively heavier loads than BSPs. Although BSPs had higher absolute values for mass and lift, LSPs were more energy-efficient. The muscle mass proportions were similar and typical for takeoff. No significant sex-based differences were found. Both species used aerobic and anaerobic takeoff, with anaerobic flight likely being more efficient. Full article

Feather sexing, based on wing feather growth rate, is a widely used method for chick sex identification. However, it still relies on manual sorting, necessitating automation. This study proposes an improved SAG-YOLO method for chick sex detection. Firstly, the model reduces both parameter size and computational complexity by replacing the original feature extraction with the StarNet lightweight Backbone. Next, the Additive Convolutional Gated Linear Unit (Additive CGLU) module, incorporated in the Neck section, enhances multi-scale feature interaction, improving detail capture while maintaining efficiency. Furthermore, the Group Normalization Head (GN Head) decreases parameters and computational overhead while boosting generalization and detection efficiency. Experimental results demonstrate that SAG-YOLO achieves a precision (P) of 90.5%, recall (R) of 90.7%, and mean average precision (mAP) of 97.0%, outperforming YOLO v10n by 1.3%, 2.6%, and 1.5%, respectively. Model parameters and floating-point operations are reduced by 0.8633 M and 2.0 GFLOPs, with a 0.2 ms faster GPU inference speed. In video stream detection, the model achieves 100% accuracy for female chicks and 96.25% accuracy for male chicks, demonstrating strong performance under motion blur and feature fuzziness. The improved model exhibits robust generalization, providing a practical solution for the intelligent sex sorting of day-old chicks. Full article

The inability to distinguish males from females in young birds is a major obstacle for pair formation in reintroduction–restocking programs and commercial–amateur breeding. Several techniques are employed to address this problem, but not all of them are suitable for juvenile subjects. Among the various tests applied for sex determination, polymerase chain reaction (PCR) is one of the genetic tools that seems to be most effective (rapid, not invasive and cheaper). In this study, DNA was extracted from down and feathers to make the procedure less stressful for nestlings. The DNA was amplified by PCR, and the amplicon was subjected to the restriction endonucleases procedure when the gender was not clearly identified by PCR alone. One hundred and fifty-three avian species were sexed using this procedure, including 27 for the first time. In all the nestlings and juveniles tested, sex was correctly identified; in fact, all pairs that reached sexual maturity during this study gave offspring. Full article

The routine culling of male chicks in the laying hen industry raises significant ethical, animal welfare, and sustainability concerns. Current methods to determine chick embryo sex before hatching are costly, time-consuming, and invasive. This study aimed to develop a low-cost, non-invasive solution to predict chick embryo sex before hatching using the morphological features of eggs. A custom imaging apparatus was created using a smartphone and light box, enabling consistent image capture of chicken eggs. Egg length, width, area, eccentricity, and extent were measured, and machine learning models were trained to predict chick embryo sex. The wide neural network model achieved the highest accuracy of 88.9% with a mean accuracy of 81.5%. Comparison of the imaging apparatus to a high-cost industrial 3D scanner demonstrated comparable accuracy in capturing egg morphology. The findings suggest that this method can contribute to the prevention of up to 6.2 billion male chicks from being culled annually by destroying male embryos before they develop the capacity to feel pain. This approach offers a feasible, ethical, and scalable alternative to current practices, with potential for further improvements in accuracy and adaptability to different industry settings. Full article

This research aimed to enhance the diet of Thai broiler chickens (KKU 1) by assessing the impact of CABR on growth performance, carcass yield, and meat composition. A total of 320 one-day-old mixed-sex (1:1) Thai KKU 1 broiler chicks were randomly assigned to five dietary treatments incorporating CABR at levels of 0%, 3%, 6%, 9%, and 12%. The chicks were fed for a period of 56 days, divided into three phases: 1–21, 22–49, and 50–56 days. In the grower phase, birds receiving 3% and 6% CABR displayed the lowest feed conversion ratio (FCR) compared to other groups, while their body weight (BW) and BW gain (BWG) were significantly higher than those of other treatments (p < 0.05). In the finisher phase, performance differences were minimal, except for birds on the 3% CABR diet, which had greater BW than those on 9% or 12% CABR diets. Overall, throughout all phases, the inclusion of 3% CABR resulted in improved BWG and FCR compared to other groups across the study period (p < 0.05). Additionally, the 12% CABR treatment reduced dressing percentage compared to other groups, but it did not negatively impact the relative organ weights of the carcass or the quality of breast meat. Incorporating 3% and 12% CABR resulted in the highest values recorded for gross energy and ether extract in breast meat (p < 0.05). Furthermore, the gross energy of thigh meat increased with 3% to 12% CABR inclusion, peaking at the 6% CABR treatment (p < 0.05). This study found that adding 3% or 6% CABR to the diet of Thai broiler chickens improves their growth without negatively impacting meat or carcass quality. Full article

This study investigates the effects of the Bacillus licheniformis (BL) ATCC 21424 strain, as a potential bacterial probiotic in broiler diets based on soybean meal (SBM) or cowpea seeds (CWP), on growth performance (GP), bone mineralization, and intestinal/fecal microbiota status (0 to 42 d age). A 2 × 2 factorial arrangement was employed in a completely randomized design, with four dietary treatments: SBM and CWP diets with or without BL supplementation (1.0 × 10¹¹ CFU spores g⁻¹ feed). A total of 480 one-day-old mixed-sex Ross 308 broiler chickens were randomly assigned to the treatments, with 6 pens of 20 chicks each. The results showed that broilers fed with CWP diets showed comparable body weight gain (BWG), feed intake (FI), and feed conversion rate to those fed the SBM diet (p > 0.05). The inclusion of BL improved BWG during the grower and finisher periods (p = 0.01) and overall study (p < 0.001), resulting in a numerical increase in FI (p = 0.054). In addition, BL in birds’ diets reduced abdominal fat (p = 0.032) and influenced cecum weight (p = 0.040). Additionally, BL improved tibia iron (Fe) and phosphorus (P) bone mineralization and reduced the calcium–phosphorus (Ca:P) ratio (p = 0.0001). Microbial analysis revealed that BL inclusion decreased Coliforms counts in the CWP diet (p = 0.073), reduced E. coli in the ileum (p ≤ 0.05), and lowered Clostridium spp. and Enterococcus spp. in the cecum broilers on SBM diets (p ≤ 0.05). The presence of Staphylococcus spp. in broiler feces was also reduced in both SBM and CWP groups (p < 0.05). In conclusion, the addition of BL to broiler diets enhanced growth performance and bone mineralization and positively influenced gut and excreta bacterial populations in both SBM and CWP diets. Full article

This study aimed to evaluate the effects of the replacement of rice bran oil (RBO) with black soldier fly larvae oil (BSFLO) on growth performance, blood biochemicals, carcass quality, and metabolomics profile of breast muscle of Thai native chickens. A total of 192 1-day-old, mixed-sex, Pradu Hang Dam (Mor Kor 55) chickens were randomly allocated to one of three dietary groups. Each treatment had four replicates with 16 chicks per replicate (8 males and 8 females). Three dietary treatments were used: (T1) the control group, based on a corn–soybean meal with RBO, and two treatment groups that replaced 50% (T2) and 75% (T3) of RBO in the basal diet with BSFLO, respectively. Results showed that BSFLO inclusion at 50% and 75% did not adversely affect the productive performance of Thai native chickens (p > 0.05). Regarding blood profiles, on day 28, chickens fed 75% BSFLO exhibited significant increases in hemoglobin, hematocrit, and MCHC (mean corpuscular hemoglobin concentration) with lower eosinophil percentages compared to the control group (p < 0.05). Additionally, BSFLO supplementation raised glucose levels but decreased globulin and total protein levels (p < 0.05). On day 63, BSFLO inclusion primarily affected MCV (mean corpuscular volume), with higher values in the 50% BSFLO group (p < 0.05). It also increased globulin and HDL (high-density lipoprotein) levels while lowering AST (aspartate transaminase) concentrations (p < 0.05). For carcass and meat quality, BSFLO supplementation did not affect dressing percentage or edible meat yield (p > 0.05). However, it influenced meat pH and shear force (p < 0.05), with a higher pH at 24 h post-mortem in BSFLO-fed chickens. Metabolomics showed that arginine biosynthesis; phenylalanine, tyrosine, and tryptophan metabolism; alanine, aspartate, and glutamate metabolism; arginine and proline metabolism; and taurine and hypotaurine metabolism were the most differentially abundant. These findings suggest that BSFLO can be used for a partial replacement (50 to 75%) for RBO in Thai native chicken diets, potentially offering benefits for animal health and meat quality without compromising growth performance. Full article

Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFASs) are contaminants of great concern due to their ubiquitous environmental occurrence in the environment and their potential adverse effects on organisms. There is currently limited information regarding the occurrence of PFASs in Scopoli’s Shearwater (Calonectris diomedea). In this study, two feather samples per bird were obtained from 26 adults on Strofades colony (Ionian Sea/Greece) during the early phase of the chick-rearing period (late July 2019). The samples consisted of barbs and barbules of the primary feathers, P1 and P10, reflecting pollution pressures at the time and the place of feather growth, i.e., at the species’ breeding and wintering grounds for P1 and P10, respectively. There were 25 PFAS detected in the feathers, with detection rates ranging from 2% (perfluorododecanoic acid—PFDoDA; perfluorohexane sulfonate—PFHxS; 9-chlorohexadecafluoro-3-oxanonane-1-sulfonate—9Cl-PF3ONS; 2,3,3,3-tetrafluoro-2-(1,1,2,2,3,3,3-heptafluoropropoxy)propanoate—Gen-X) to 98% (sodium 1H,1H,2H,2H-perfluorooctane sulfonate; 6:2 FTSA). ∑PFAS ranged from 25.93 ng/g to 426.86 ng/g of feather sample. The highest mean concentration (109.10 ng/g feather) was reported for perfluorononanoic acid (PFNA). No significant differences in PFAS concentrations with high detection rate (>20%) were found according to the sex of the birds. PFAS concentrations with a detection rate > 20% in the P1 vs. P10 feathers of Scopoli’s Shearwater adults were not significantly different, reflecting the fact that breeding grounds in the Mediterranean and wintering grounds in the Atlantic seem to be contaminated with similar PFASs levels, even though some compounds showed regional trends. Full article

This study aimed to investigate the physiochemical characterizations of the fermented product (FP) produced by the high-yield surfactin strain Bacillus subtilis LYS1 (LYS1), as well as its effects on growth performance, carcass traits, intestinal morphology, tibial bone characteristics, and clinical blood biochemistry in broilers. Accordingly, the optimal supplementation of FP for improving growth performance, intestinal villi development, and tibial bone strength in broilers was elucidated using a broken-line quadratic (BLQ) ascending model. Three hundred and sixty 0-day-old Ross 308 broiler chicks, with equal numbers of both sexes, were randomly assigned to dietary supplementation of 2.5% fish meal or 0, 1, 1.5, 2, or 2.5% FP. Each treatment had six replicates, and the experimental period was 5 wk. The LYS1 count, surfactin content, and surfactin composition of the FP were 9.1 log CFU/g, 11.23 mg/g, and C₁₂ to C₁₈, respectively. The FP-supplemented groups improved feed intake, weight gain (WG), and production efficiency factor at 0 to 5 weeks old (p < 0.05) compared with the 0% group. The villus height/crypt depth (V/C) in the jejunum and ileum of the FP-supplemented groups was higher than in the 0% group (p < 0.05). The tibiotarsal index, Ca, and P in the tibia showed a linear effect with increased FP supplementation (p < 0.05). Moreover, the tibiotarsus weight/length index (TWLI) showed a quadratic effect with increased FP supplementation (p < 0.05). The optimal supplementation of FP for WG, V/C in the jejunum and ileum, and TWLI was 1.8, 1.9, and 1.6%, respectively. In conclusion, dietary supplementation with 1 to 2.5% LYS1 FP in broilers can improve their growth performance and the development of intestinal villi. Moreover, 1.9% is the optimal supplementation of LYS1 FP in the diet, based on the fitting results obtained with the BLQ model. Full article

The effects and interactions of incubation time and chick preplacement holding time on mortality at placement, utilization of yolk sac, crop filling rate, early feeding–drinking behavior, and broiler live performance were investigated. Ross 308 broiler hatching eggs from a 39-week-old flock were set in two identical setters in a commercial hatchery, with the setting time 12 h earlier in one machine. At the end of incubation, chicks were removed from the hatchers at the same time. Thus, the incubation times were either 504 h (normal incubation time (NIT) treatment) or 516 h (longer incubation time (LIT) treatment). After the pull time, chicks from each incubation time group were subjected to either 6, 24, 48, 60, or 72 h preplacement holding times. At placement, chicks were given access to feed and water. In total, 19,200 chicks were randomly assigned to a total of 10 subtreatment groups (2 incubation times × 5 preplacement holding times). Therefore, a total of 1920 chicks were used in each subtreatment group for the grow-out period in a commercial broiler house. For the first week of the experiment, 160 randomly selected as-hatched (not sexed) chicks were placed in 12 replicate floor pens (120 total pens). From the second week of age onward, chicks from two pens were combined into six replicate pens, with 320 chicks per replicate (60 total pens). An interaction was found between incubation time and preplacement holding time for residual yolk sac (RYS) weight (g, %) (p < 0.001). RYS weight was greater at pull time and at 6 and 24 h of preplacement holding in the NIT treatment compared to the LIT treatment, while differences were no longer evident at 48–72 h. The lowest percentage of chicks with full crops and eating activity was observed in the shortest preplacement holding time (6 h) group at 3 h after placement. As expected, the initial BW at placement clearly decreased with increasing duration after the pull time (p < 0.05), with the highest and lowest weights found in the 6 and 72 h holding time treatments, respectively. This BW difference was still evident at 35 d after placement and chicks held for the longest period after the pull time (72 h) showed the lowest BW (p < 0.001). However, there was no significant difference between the 6 and 60 h preplacement holding times. Mortality during the first 7 d after placement increased only when the preplacement holding time was extended to 72 h (p = 0.031). Similarly to the 7 d results, chicks held for 72 h exhibited higher 0–35 day mortality compared to those held for 6 or 24 h (p = 0.028). Neither BW nor mortality was affected by incubation time treatment at 35 d after placement (p > 0.05). It can be concluded that there were no significant differences in average BW and mortality, up to and including a 60 h holding time under thermal comfort conditions, but a 72 h preplacement holding time resulted in final BW and mortality being negatively affected. In addition, LIT tended to have a beneficial effect on BW and mortality compared to NIT when the preplacement holding time was shorter (6–24 h) but had a negative effect for extended holding times (48–72 h). Full article

We tested the novel cross of the old local breed Deutsches Lachshuhn and the layer breed White Rock, as well as purebred Deutsches Lachshuhn, for their suitability as dual-purpose chickens under 100% organic husbandry conditions, and compared their performance and welfare with the two dual-purpose crosses New Hampshire × Bresse and Bresse × White Rock, which are already established in Germany. Chicks were reared in mixed-sex groups until slaughter of the males at 15 or 18 weeks of life. Data on laying performance and animal welfare were recorded until the hens’ 72nd week of life. Laying performance of Deutsches Lachshuhn × White Rock was almost twice as high as that in purebred hens, while fattening performance of the males did not differ. Deutsches Lachshuhn × White Rock, New Hampshire × Bresse and Bresse × White Rock realized a balanced performance profile of 242–250 eggs per hen alive and a final live weight of the males of 2924–3105 g after 18 weeks of rearing. The efficiency of a pair of chickens (one male and one female) was very similar for the crosses (3.69–3.77 kg feed kg⁻¹ marketable product), while purebred Deutsches Lachshuhn was less efficient (6.35 kg feed kg⁻¹ marketable product). Crossing the breed Deutsches Lachshuhn with a layer breed therefore improved laying performance and overall efficiency of the birds compared to purebred Deutsches Lachshuhn. Full article

This study investigated the anticoccidial activity of spinach (Spinacia oleracea) whole-plant extract against Eimeria tenella, both in vitro and in vivo. For this purpose, one hundred 8-day-old broiler chicks of both sexes were divided into four groups (n = 25 in each group). Chicks in the first group served as the negative control (non-treated–non-infected). Chicks in the second group were challenged at 18 days old with 5 × 10⁴ E. tenella sporulated oocysts. The third group was challenged with 5 × 10⁴ sporulated E. tenella oocysts at 18 days old after receiving spinach extract at a dose of 50 mg/kg at 8 days old. The fourth group received 0.2 mg/kg diclazuril (Coxiril^® 0.2%) in their diet two days before being orally infected with 5 × 10⁴ sporulated E. tenella oocysts and this continued till day 10 post-infection (PI). The growth performance, clinical symptoms, oocyst shedding, histological findings, and biochemical parameters were used to evaluate the efficacy on day 8 PI when the infection was at its peak. A gas chromatography examination revealed that omega-3 fatty acids were the main constituents of the spinach extract, followed by oleic acid, palmitic acid, and phytol, with amounts of 23.37%, 17.53%, 11.26%, and 7.97%, respectively. The in vitro investigation revealed that the spinach extract at concentrations of 10% and 5% inhibited the oocyst sporulation by 52.1% and 45.1%, respectively. The 5% concentration was selected for the in vivo trial based on the results of the in vitro study. The infected–untreated group showed high levels of OPG; lower body weight; a greater number of parasite stages; few goblet cells; decreased SOD, CAT, and GPX levels; and increased MDA and NO levels. The spinach-treated group, on the other hand, showed a significant decrease in oocyst output per gram of feces (OPG), increased body weight, decreased parasitic stages, and a nearly normal number of goblet cells. Additionally, it reduced malondialdehyde (MDA) and nitric oxide (NO), while increasing superoxide dismutase (SOD), catalase (CAT), and glutathione peroxidase (GPX). In conclusion, spinach produced significant antioxidant effects, increased body weight, reduced the number of oocysts and parasite stages in the caecum, and restored the number of goblet cells relative to those of an uninfected control. Furthermore, spinach extract inhibits the sporulation percentage of E. tenella oocysts. The ethanolic extract of S. oleracea (whole plant) contained high concentrations of fatty acids, palmitic acid, Phytol, betulin, and ursolic aldehyde, all of which are known to regulate the antioxidant pathway and modulate inflammatory processes and may be the main reason for its anticoccidial activity. Full article

The identification of a chicken’s sex is a massive task in the poultry industry. To solve the problems of traditional artificial observation in determining sex, such as time-consuming and laborious, a sex identification method of chicken embryos based on blood vessel images and deep learning was preliminarily investigated. In this study, we designed an image acquisition platform to capture clear blood vessel images with a black background. 19,748 images of 3024 Jingfen No. 6 breeding eggs were collected from days 3 to 5 of incubation in Beijing Huadu Yukou Poultry Industry. Sixteen thousand seven hundred sixty-one images were filtered via color sexing in 1-day-old chicks and constructed the dataset of this study. A sex identification model was proposed based on an improved YOLOv7 deep learning algorithm. An attention mechanism CBAM was introduced for YOLOv7 to improve the accuracy of sex identification of chicken eggs; the BiFPN feature fusion was used in the neck network of YOLOv7 to fuse the low-level and high-level features efficiently; and α-CIOU was used as the bounding box loss function to accelerate regression prediction and improve the positioning accuracy of the bounding box of the model. Results showed that the mean average precision (mAP) of 88.79% was achieved by modeling with the blood vessel data on day 4 of incubation of chicken eggs, with the male and female reaching 87.91% and 89.67%. Compared with the original YOLOv7 network, the mAP of the improved model was increased by 3.46%. The comparison of target detection model results showed that the mAP of our method was 32.49%, 17.17%, and 5.96% higher than that of SSD, Faster R-CNN, and YOLOv5, respectively. The average image processing time was 0.023 s. Our study indicates that using blood vessel images and deep learning has great potential applications in the sex identification of chicken embryos. Full article

Mediterranean Shag (Gulosus aristotelis desmarestii) is a seabird endemic to the Mediterranean and Black Seas, recently included in the IUCN list of threatened Species. Most of the reproductive colonies are hosted in Sardinia and surrounding islets. Bycatch in fishing nets is one of the most significant threats for this population. Our work aimed to assess alterations in the sex ratio caused by bycatch and to study the adaptive response of the population to a skewed adult sex ratio. The sex ratio of Mediterranean Shags found drowned in the gillnets near the colonies and that of the nestlings of the Corcelli (northeast Sardinia) colony was determined using the sex-linked polymorphism of the gene Chromobox-Helicase-DNA-binding 1. The data of the shags found drowned in gillnets evidenced a high mortality rate (83.3%; p < 0.001) and a larger size of males (35% heavier than females, p < 0.05) compared to females, supporting the theory that heavier individuals are able to forage at great depths. With 64.8% of the nestlings being male, the sex ratio of nestlings was statistically different from parity (p < 0.05). Furthermore, it was related to the brood size. In one- and two-chick broods, 73% and 70% of nestlings, respectively, were males, while in three-chick broods, only 33% were males. Our data identify the higher rate of male shags drowned in gillnets as a factor causing an alteration of the sex ratio in the Mediterranean Shag population. According to the Sex Allocation Theory, an adaptive adjustment of sex made by adult females restores the Mendelian sex ratio in the population. Full article