How can one save broilers during hot weather ?

Question

When we talk about domestic birds, Broilers are considered the weakest in their specie. They need to be carefully and hygienically looked after to avoid losses. Once they get infected or are not properly sheltered their deaths occur in large numbers. Various things could lead to their deaths and these could include; dirty environment, disease outbreak, poor nutrition, improper vaccination/treatment, extreme cold and hot weather and exposure to predators.

All these are very harmful to birds and should be closely monitored. While other factors can be consciously managed, the weather is a great factor that isn’t under the farmer’s control and as such adjustments will have to be made in extreme atmospheric conditions to suite the desired temperature of the birds.

DURING COLD SEASONS

Its relatively easier to manage these birds in cold atmospheric conditions by making the poultry as warm as possible, this includes properly covering openings that allows the cold wind blowing in, using high voltage bulbs which emits heat, lanterns and stoves to keep the cold away. They also have a way of keeping warm by forming clusters so as to exchange body heat to maintain their desired temperature, although this practice is helpful for the grown birds, its extremely detrimental to chicks as they may likely get crushed in this warmth pursuit.

DURING HOT SEASONS

Whilst the cold seasons are easier to manage the hot seasons on the other hand could be more tasking because there’s no known way of generating natural winds in the tmosphere or making hot winds cold. In these weather condition farmers are advised to take more extreme steps to keep their birds from dying;

Birds loose heat from surfaces like wattles, shanks, and unfeathered areas underneath wings. to keep up blood heat by smart heat loss, the bird doesn’t ought to drastically change its traditional activity patterns, feed intake, or metabolism. The aim of poultry house ventilation is to keep up a high enough air rate or an occasional enough temperature within the house that the birds will maintain blood heat by reasonable heat loss.

The first step to take in guaranteeing optimum nutrient intake despite decreases in feed consumption is to extend the nutrient density of the ratio. Recent analysis indicates that low phosphorus consumption will contribute to enlarged heatstroke losses.

Another way is to feed the birds at the time of day once feed consumption is highest. The light-to-dark cycle ends up in a formed feed consumption curve. Once there is a lose in weight, feed consumption is high. It declines bit by bit throughout the day then will increase about one hour before lights are turned off. If birds are fed throughout the cool a part of the day, feed consumption are going to be higher. Birds mustn’t be fed throughout the afternoon in periods of high atmospheric condition since this may increase the amount of body heat that they need to dissipate and therefore increase the potential for warmth prostration. Abrupt changes in feeding times ought to be avoided.

A third technique is to cool down the birds the maximum amount as doable throughout the evening hours. Hens or meat birds tend to create up body heat throughout extended periods of atmospheric condition. If their blood heat are often reduced throughout the evening , the birds are going to be ready to consume a lot of feed the first morning. The house will be cooled within the evening by setting the fan thermostats in order that the fans can still run till the inner house temperature reaches 75°F (65°F for mature birds).


References:

www.thepoultrysite.com

www.poultrytimes.com

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