Selective breeding for social chickens may reduce mortality rates

According to the results of a project headed by Piter Bijma with the Breeding and Genetics Group from Wageningen University in the Netherlands, selective breeding of chickens with an eye towards social conduct may reduce flock mortality by as much as two-thirds, resulting in rates comparable to those when using the beak-trimming method.
Together with researcher Esther Ellen, Bijma studied 1,000 beak-trimmed layers in cages. Total mortality among the chickens was 30% due to aggressive picking, but the per-cage mortality numbers differed. The two researchers took the chickens from the cages with the lowest mortality rates and bred them. After the third selection round, each time taking the most "social" chickens and breeding them, mortality rates had dropped to roughly 12%. "These figures come close to the figures of beak-trimmed layers, where the normal mortality rate is around 10%," said Bijma.
The next research step, according to Bijma and Ellen, is to breed another two generations of layers to see if the mortality rate will continue to fall and possibly reach the 10% number.

US Poultry Handling and Transportation Quality Assurance Program to launch in spring

The Poultry Handling and Transportation Quality Assurance Program, a new program at The Pennsylvania State University, will be the first in the U.S. to provide third-party training, proficiency testing and certification on the correct techniques for handling and transporting poultry, according to The Poultry Science Association.
Scheduled to launch in late spring, the PHTQA will offer multiple one-day training sessions to transportation and catch crews on biosecurity, disease recognition, emergency planning and the safe and humane handling of birds. With the exception of ducks, the PHTQA will cover every segment of the poultry industry, including day-old poultry, pullets, spent fowl, broilers, leghorn and broiler breeders and turkeys.
PHTQA training will initially focus on companies in the Northeast, though depending on interest it may eventually serve as the foundation for a national program, said Dr. Eva Wallner-Pendleton, PHTQA’s senior editor and project coordinator and an avian pathologist and field investigator at Penn State’s Animal Diagnostic Laboratory. “While we have yet to conduct our first training session, we have already received a tremendous response – including international inquiries – from the program website," said Wallner-Pendleton. "There’s increasing pressure from the general public and others, both here and abroad, to ensure that animals are being handled humanely. While many companies have excellent in-house training on animal welfare and poultry quality assurance, this pressure has generated the need – and the desire among many poultry companies – for third-party certification. This program is designed to meet that demand."
Training sessions will be conducted by members of the PHTQA development team and will take place at the individual companies where bird handlers and transporters are located. At a later point, plans are to hold “train the trainer” sessions so that more individuals are qualified to conduct training.

Japan culls additional 190,000 chickens in new bird flu outbreak

A farm in southwestern Japan has culled 190,000 chickens to contain the seventh outbreak of avian flu in Miyazaki Prefecture and the tenth in Japan this winter.
The government has banned the transportation of eggs and chickens within six miles of the infected farm, and a meat processing factory was also closed down, according to authorities. Overall, more than 500,000 chickens have been culled in Japan since Jan. 22 due to various outbreaks.

Do we really have to create issues for PETA?

A recent press release by PETA and consequential national publicity in the print and social media highlighted the practice of disposing of depleted flocks by grinding hens alive. We have faced this issue with cockerel chicks and received criticism as an industry. Following the quarantine on the movement of live poultry from San Bernardino and Riverside counties of California in 2002 as a result of exotic Newcastle disease, producers had to find alternatives to shipping hens northward to a Sacramento processing plant. One producer fed live hens into a wood chipper resulting in a public outcry and condemnation.
Now the industry is faced with the aftermath of a PETA disclosure that the management of TWJ Farms located in Wayne County, Neb., regularly disposes of spent hens by grinding live birds without prior CO² euthanasia. The owner of the farm Joe Claybaugh defended the action which hopefully is an aberration, by stating without physiological evidence “that the grinding process kills the chickens more quickly than gassing and is therefore more humane.”
Witnesses of the process recount alleged mutilation and partial dismemberment of individual hens during the process. How this Neanderthal can consider the practice of live grinding “humane” defies imagination. Live grinding is heinous and must be condemned in the strongest possible terms. Cost is the only justification for not gassing hens in “kill carts” or dumpsters prior to grinding or other methods of disposal.
What Claybaugh in his ignorance and self-centered indifference forgets is the effect on the image of the industry. Our loyal consumers can relate to inhumane practices including severe beak trim (read “de-beaking”), starvation molting and now this patently abhorrent method of depletion. The fact that TWJ Farms is a supplier to Michael Foods did not pass unnoticed and this company was forced to respond by banning the practice with immediate effect.
It remains to be seen whether the UEP will issue a statement of condemnation and disassociating the mainstream of the industry from the callous and irresponsible actions of this producer. It does not require a panel of experts to rule on this gross deviation from acceptable management of living animals. It also does not require a consumer survey to establish the public resentment towards live grinding. A rapid response from UEP or their public relations consultants would have been helpful as many consumers may regard silence as endorsement or indifference.
If there are other producers engaging in this practice they should cease grinding live hens immediately and initiate CO² gassing prior to disposal. We absolutely do not want to hand PETA, HSUS and kindred organizations any issues which reflect adversely on what may be regarded as an industry committed to humane practices. Gross violation of acceptable husbandry inevitably leads to restrictive legislation and increased scrutiny by regulatory agencies. This affects the innocent and those who follow acceptable codes of practice.
The Claybaughs within our industry and others with an evident disregard of their responsibilities as participants in the chain of food production and stewardship of living animals should be condemned and their practices brought into conformity with acceptable standards.

Plans for Russia’s poultry, egg producers revealed at EuroTier

Russia wants to move beyond achieving self-sufficiency in chicken and eggs to become an exporter of poultry products, the president of the Russian Poultry Union has told an international poultry panel convened in Germany at the time of the EuroTier 2010 exhibition.
One of the first signs of that ambition is likely to be the development of more facilities to process eggs, so increasing the country’s potential to take a share of the fast-growing international market for egg powder and related products.
Currently, only four major enterprises in Russia have capacity for processing at least one million eggs per day, said RPU president Vladimir Fisinin when addressing the global poultry outlook panel discussion arranged by the European Poultry Club in association with industry associations from Russia, China and the European Union. However, Prof. Fisinin added, plans have been prepared to build 20 new egg processing plants in the near future, each capable of dealing with over one million eggs daily.
“We lag behind other countries in our capacity for processing eggs,” he commented. “At present, only 12-13% of our egg production goes into liquid pasteurized egg products and dry egg powder.”
By 2012, he revealed, the expectation in Russia is that national production of eggs in will rise by about 5% to 43 billion per year. The Russian Poultry Union projects that this output could grow to about 50 billion eggs per year by 2020.
Extra productivity will provide part of the increase, he suggested. The average number of eggs per hen nationally has risen already from 302 in 2005 to 304 in 2009, with the best producers now averaging in the range of 325-330 eggs per hen. A parallel rise has occurred for the volume of enriched eggs, until some 15.5% of production today involving eggs with enrichments such as for omega-3 fatty acids, vitamins and iodine.
Functional foods represent one of the most effective ways of addressing health problems in humans, such as from a subclinical iodine deficiency, Prof. Fisinin continued. Russian researchers have patented eggs in which the iodine content is 1.5 times as much as in standard eggs. Experimentally, they have also produced broiler chickens containing 25-30% more iodine in the breast and leg meat.

Tecno receives American Humane Association 'Seal of Approval' for 'Colony Plus 60' poultry housing system

Tecno Poultry Equipment has received the "Seal of Approval" from the American Humane Association for its Colony Plus 60 enriched colony housing.
The Seal of Approval is presented when a company's housing system satisfies all the requirements of the Facility System Plan Design review. Tecno can now market the housing as meeting humane standards. The award was presented on Nov. 1.

Russia to stop selling frozen poultry in 2011

Russia has announced that it will no longer sell frozen poultry beginning in January 2011.
The transition has been in the works since 2008, according to Federal Service for Supervision of Consumer Rights Protection and Human Welfare head Gennady Onishchenko. "[Freezing poultry] is an outdated and rough technology which leads to a loss of many of the useful qualities of meat," he said. Instead of freezing technology, according to Onishchenko, the poultry will be chilled in inert gas, which permits storage for up to 120 days. 
Concerns are already being raised at this announcement. "I can hardly imagine a producer who would be happy with a ban on frozen poultry turnover," said Sergei Yushin, head of an executive committee at the National Meat Association. "Some consumers will be deprived of the product." Yushin also asserts that the technology for chilling poultry with inert gas does not exist.
As for U.S. chicken imports, Onishchenko said, "You are welcome to import poultry, but only chilled, not frozen." Poultry cannot be exported chilled. "It is a corporate decision made on the basis of analysis," said Onishchenko. "I have received loads of letters from governors who thank us and say that Russian producers can guarantee chilled poultry deliveries to consumers without deep freezing."

Oklahoma farmers gain $14.5 million judgment

Three hundred farmers who brought a class-action lawsuit against OK Industries saw their complaint upheld in court for $14.5 million.
The farmers had alleged that the company used its status as the only buyer in the area to manipulate in its favor what it paid to the farmers. "We wanted fair treatment," said Charlie Been, a former chicken farmer who was part of the lawsuit. The case went to trial in 2008, resulting in a jury verdict for the farmers of $21.1 million that was later reduced to $14.5 million. Attorney for OK Industries Charles Goodwin said he does not know whether the company will appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court or ask for a rehearing with the full court of appeals.

Hoosier Pride plans farm for 2 million chickens

Hoosier Pride Farms has submitted an application with the Indiana Department of Environmental Management seeking permission to start a farm with up to 2 million chickens in eastern Indiana, according to The Star Press.
The farm would be located in eastern Jay county near the state line. Keith Boeckman, who applied for the permit on behalf of the company, said the operation will be a six-barn confined animal feeding operation housing between 1.5 and 2 million laying hens. He said he hopes to be operational within the next 12 months.

Pollution trial involving Perdue to proceed

A trial against Perdue Farms and Maryland chicken farmers, Alan and Kristin Hudson, will move forward after a federal judge refused to dismiss the case accusing them of polluting a tributary of the Chesapeake Bay, according to a Baltimore Sun report.
The suit filed in March by the Waterkeeper Alliance, the Assateague Coastal Trust and Assateague Coastkeeper Kathy Phillips says a branch of the Pocomoke River received harmful levels of bacteria and nutrient pollution that flowed from a drainage ditch on the farm where chickens were raised for the company. Perdue and the Hudsons argued for dismissal on a variety of legal grounds, and Perdue said it should be let out of the lawsuit because it does not own the farm where chickens were raised under permit.