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How’s your broiler business going?. We hope it’s all good for you. However as a good businessman/woman it is better for you to read every material that could help your farm growth and make it more profitable than before. Which is why we will always provide a reliable material for your broilers. We have talked about common diseases in broilers but this time we will talk about lameness or feet injury in broilers. Why this is important anyway?.
Broiler chicken is a genetized chicken which purposed to serve human’s needs of chicken meats. That is why it is easier to take care broiler chicken and it even grow quickly than any other chicken. Broiler chicken just need a food and water, clean farmhouse, clean food and water system, and clean ventilation system. It does not need special care such as fighting rooster or a black rooster. Also when any other chicken such as rooster will take around 4 months to fully grow, broiler chicken just need around 2 months and it’s even ready to be slaughtered. So it’s quick and efficient to have broilers meat to fulfill human’s needs of chicken meat than having any other chicken breed for it, right?.
Well, this quick growth does not come with a price. Broilers quick growth surely have side effect towards the chicken itself. The quick growth affected chicken bone structural thus sometimes it is common for you to see there are many different size of your broilers, you could see “oh this chicken is a big one, but why this chicken smaller and having a funny feet?.” (assuming both of the broilers is in the same age) because of the quick growth in their gene it would be possible for them to have body abnormalities thus making them have variant size. However this quick growth also affected the bone structural of broilers. Especially their bone feet, quick growth making them grow quickly but sometimes it making their bone growth is not completed yet, is just like blowing a balloon but without stuffing anything into it. Thus making the bone fragile and causing your broilers suffered from lameness in their feet hence downgrading your broiler’s meat quality.
Unique Fact about Broiler Lameness
You may think this broiler lameness is not an important matter, however lameness according to researchers of Animal Welfare could cause a stress towards your broiler thus downgrading their meat quality. As emotion in livestock could determine whether the meat would have a superb quality or awful quality. So if your broilers suffered from lameness be ready to harvest an awful meat for your customers thus losing your customers trust.
Not only that, in Europe according to researchers of Animal Welfare, there are 30 percent of broilers who suffered lameness. This making 30 percent of broiler’s meat quality in europe become questionable. We recommend you to note to causes of lameness in broiler chicken :
- Early Extreme Feeding
New farmer often give their broiler chicks an early extreme feeding. Giving them a large amount of food in their early week. Hoping that their broilers would grow quickly thus able to give profit as soon as possible to the farmer. Yes, indeed giving an early extreme feeding would make your broilers grow quickly but once again it’s not without a cost. The cost that you must pay is imperfect structural bones of your chicken thus making your chicken suffered of lameness hence making them stressed out then downgrading their meat’s quality. That is the price that you must pay if you insisted of giving your broilers an early extreme feeding. If you want to avoid lameness that was caused by extreme feeding then you must apply diet method for your broilers in order to avoid lameness. According to Animal Welfare researchers here is how you applied diet method for your broilers.
E means energy food and P means protein food. So you must use 48 hour cycle for each day with different portion type of food everyday. For example this day you will feed your broilers with less energy foods but with more protein foods and tomorrow you will feed them with more energy food but with less protein foods.
- Incubation Temperature
Incubation has a significant effect towards your broiler’s quality which makes it the key factor on how to success in broiler’s farm business. According to researcher, it is recommended to have incubation which has humidity around 37.8 – 38.1 celcius degree are the optimum temperature if you want to have a good quality broilers.
However if you don’t take this matter seriously then prepare that your broilers may suffers from lameness since they were hatched from their eggs. Making a certain failure towards their meat’s quality thus making your profit decreased because of your low quality broiler’s meat. So if you want a good quality broilers with a good bone and meat then watch your incubation temperature.
- Contaminated Food
Food is one of key factors to have a good quality broilers. Having a good quality food surely will help your broilers reached it’s maximum growth. However if you already gave them a good quality food and good incubation but still they suffered from lamenes it might be caused by their food is contaminated by bacteria who caused lameness on your chicken. This bacteria will contaminate broiler’s food then after a flock of broilers consume it, they will be inside the broilers thus consuming their bones and destroying it from inside hence making your broilers suffered from lameness.
As a owner, you must know what could make your broilers food become contaminated. Contamination in the food surely is caused by dreadful food box which is dirty and lack of hygene quality. The dirty situation of the food box would help the bacteria grow quickly thus making them easily contaminated your chicken food. So remember to frequently clean your broiler’s food box to avoid bacteria to contaminate the food.
Note
You still able to sell your broilers with lameness but we strongly against it because it could downgrade the meat’s quality and making your broilers less profitable. If you put more effort to your business and work hard so you will receive a big profit then you must aware of lameness and try to avoid it as best as you can. Good Luck!.
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