PRODUCTIVITY AND WALKING ABILITY OF BROILERS CHICKENS HOUSED IN ENVIRONMENTS WITH AND WITHOUT ENRICHMENT

• Grant number: 18/07801-2
• Support Opportunities: Regular Research Grants
• Start date: July 01, 2018
• End date: June 30, 2020
• Field of knowledge: Agronomical Sciences - Animal Husbandry - Animal Production
• Principal Investigator: Ibiara Correia de Lima Almeida Paz
• Grantee: Ibiara Correia de Lima Almeida Paz
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Medicina Veterinária e Zootecnia (FMVZ). Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Campus de Botucatu. Botucatu , SP, Brazil

Abstract

The objective of this work will be the possibility of implementing environmental enrichment aiming to decrease the incidence of locomotive problems in broilers and increase productivity, in addition to previously identifying the appearance of locomotor problems, detecting inflammatory processes, using the technique of infrared thermography (TIV) and to verify if environmental enrichment can minimize such problems. For the project, 4200 broilers of the Cobb® Slow strain will be acquired, with 1 day of age from a commercial hatchery, distributed in three experimental treatments, one environment without enrichment and another enriched with bales of hay and perches. At the same time, 200 day-old male chicks of the same lineage will be housed in partial confinement environment, in poultry's house with management center and access to pickets with forage and arboreal shading. Both experiments will evaluate: behavior of the animals through cameras, performance, carcass yield and parts, assessment of locomotion and well-being (Gait score and Latency to lie) and quality of bone tissue, pododermatitis, spondylolisthesis, myopathies (dorsal cranial, woodding and spaghetti breasts) and thermographic evaluations. The data will be submitted to statistical analysis, using the SAS 9.2 program, using ANOVA and Tukey's test (p <0.05) for parametric data and Exact Fisher's Test or Chi-square (p <0.05), for non-parametric data. (AU)