The XVth European Poultry Conference, organized by the World’s Poultry Science Association, took place in Dubrovnik, Croatia during mid-September.
With over 200 oral presentation and 300 posters, along with a small commercial exhibition, the event, according to its organizers, offered a unique mix of industry and academia.
Breeding
First to present was Dr. Michele Tixier-Boichard, AgroParisTech, France, who looked at whether there are limits to selection in poultry.
Papers have already been published on selection reaching plateaus, and Tixier-Boichard went on to explore selection theory and its possible limits, biological limits and decreased fitness, along with ethical and environmental limits.
She noted, for example, that where biological limits are concerned, there are several examples in which selection response has been limited by a decrease in fitness.
Where ethics are concerned, questions are raised, answers are not given, and she cited the examples of hunger in feed-restricted broiler breeders, cannibalism and beak trimming.
She addressed who should have responsibility when ethical questions arise: Should it be breeders, producers, processors and retailers or the end consumer?
Turning to environmental limits, bird metabolism and ambient temperature were discussed. A very fast-growing broiler will produce high metabolic heat. Twenty years ago, the comfort zone for broilers was 22-23 C, now it is approximately 16-18 C, and this comes with a cost not only for the bird but also for producers, she said.
Hatching
Servet Yalcin, Ege University, Turkey, put preincubation and hatching time, as well as broiler growth, under the microscope. Yalcin noted that embryo growth is receiving ever-more attention due to the large proportion of a broiler’s growth period that it occupies.
Chicks from younger hens hatch with a smaller amount of residual egg sac than chicks from older hens, she explained, and the age of breeder flocks tends to have a greater impact in the first weeks post-hatch than in later stages.
The critical time for embryo development is during its first state, she continued, and, during the first week of incubation, temperatures above or below the optimum would appear to affect embryonic and post-hatch development negatively.
Meat quality
Unsurprisingly, much attention was paid to breast myopathies, given that their incidence has increased in many countries. Wooden breast, for example, is thought to affect 30 percent of heavy birds in the U.S. leading to estimated annual losses of US$200 million, explained Shai Barbut, University of Guelph, Canada.
While myopathies do not present a health risk, they nevertheless lead to negative consumer perceptions, and Barbut outlines various contributing factors to their occurrence.
The genetics of broiler lines is a factor, with a difference evident between slow- and fast-growing birds. It is not the final weight of a bird that is a problem, but rather how that weight is achieved and environmental and management factors are thought to be significant contributors to myopathies occurring.
The topic was also picked up by Prof. Necmettic Ceylan, Ankara University, Turkey, who reported on studies into white striping in Turkey.
His work has found that severe white striping tends to increase as birds age, while moderate white striping tends to decrease. His work also found that 50 percent of broilers in Turkey are now affected to varying degrees by white striping.
