Understanding and preventing respiratory disease in poultry.

Understanding and preventing respiratory disease in poultry. Respiratory disease is a serious threat to the poultry industry. Each year, it determines for many producers the difference between making a profit and suffering a loss. If the birds are showing signs of infection, a producer may respond with medication. But all too often, the birds with respiratory disease exhibit no signs of infection other than underperformance. Respiratory disease is not a single virus or bacteria; it generally is a complex of both, making prevention and treatment more complicated. Even though farmers are vaccinating most flocks, respiratory lesions still turn up at slaughter on a regular basis; and these defects hurt weight gain and carcass quality.#respiratory The primary culprit in respiratory disease is ammonia, which is a result of moisture reacting with poultry droppings in the litter. Ammonia destroys the cilia (hair like projects that trap dust and other particles) in the chicken’s trachea. This leads to erosion of the tracheal lining. The irritated tracheal lining is more susceptible to infection by viruses or bacteria, and this can cause additional destruction of the trachea. Finally, E. coli bacteria from the litter can get into the trachea and result in air sacculitis. #poultry The basic way to control ammonia is keep the litter dry and remove ammonia with ventilation.Understanding and preventing respiratory disease in poultry.

How to use tea bags to increase yield on farms.

How to use tea bags to increase yield on farms.Tea adds nutrients to the soil: Tea leaves contain tannic acid and nutrients that are natural fertilizers for a garden. The bag itself is made from fiber of abaca leaf stalks. As the tea leaves decompose, they release nutrients into the soil, creating a healthier growing environment Tea bags keep pests at bay: Used tea bags and coffee grounds will help keep bugs away from your plants. The odor deters the pests from chewing on your flowers and veggies. Tea increases the decomposition of other items: If you are using teabags in your soil or compost pile, the acid in the tea can speed up the decomposition process of other items in the compost bin, which means you can use the compost faster.

Water usage versus water consumption in poultry.

Water Usage = Water Consumption + Water Spillage (WU=WC+WS). Water usage is the total amount of water going into a poultry facility’s drinker lines. Once in the drinker lines, two things happen to the water. During the drinking process, a certain percentage of the water is consumed or ingested by the birds. This can be truly categorized as water consumption. At the same time, a certain percentage of this water is spilled — it is not consumed or ingested by the birds. When a bird pecks the drinker’s trigger pin, water discharges from the drinker. If the discharged water is equal to or less than the volume that can be retained in the bird’s beak, little or no water is spilled. However, if the water discharged is greater than what can be retained in the bird’s beak, this oversupply results in water spillage. So when a poultry producer measures the amount of water going through the water meter, he or she is measuring water usage — the water going into the poultry facility that includes both water consumption and water spillage. Poultry producers know that the more water birds consume the more they eat and, as a consequence, the faster and bigger the birds grow. If the producer equates water meter readings as water consumed by the birds, then he may increase watering line column pressure in order to increase water discharge from the drinkers (confirmed by meter readings) so bird weights will increase. The problem is that, unless the birds’ beaks have grown dramatically in size and can retain all the increased water discharge, all the producer really achieves is an increase in spillage, not in water consumption. In other words, water consumption (WC) has likely remained the same, but water spillage (WS) and water usage (WU) have increased. see

Learning the fundamentals for cage-free egg success.

Learning the fundamentals for cage-free egg success. This webinar will cover major areas of cage-free layer management such as setting up proper environmental conditions for success, training the animals and the staff to successfully interact with new equipment and adding additional, empty space to the layer barn. WHAT YOU’LL LEARN: 1. How much empty space is needed in the house for proper bird behavior and aggression control. 2. What role lighting plays in bird behavior 3. How to train birds and staff to fully utilize cage-free equipment 4. The importance of good litter management . Free webinar: Register

149 LAWS OF MONEY.

149 LAWS OF MONEY. This law says that everything great and worthwhile in human life is an accumulation of hundreds and sometimes thousands of tiny efforts and sacrifices that nobody ever sees or appreciates. It says that everything accumulates over time. That you have to put in many, many, many tiny efforts that nobody sees or appreciates before you achieve anything worthwhile. It's like a snowball. A snowball starts very small, but it grows as it adds millions and millions of tiny snowflakes and continues to grow as it gathers momentum. There are three areas where the Law of Accumulation is important. The first is in the area of knowledge. Your body of knowledge is a result of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of small pieces of information. Any person with a large knowledge base has spent thousands of hours building that knowledge base one piece at a time. And what you see when you meet the individual is an expert in his or her field, with that high level of knowledge that makes him very valuable in the marketplace. The second area where the Law of Accumulation works is with regard to money. Every large fortune is an accumulation of hundreds and thousands of small amounts of money, and the place to start is to take any amount of money that you can right now and begin to save it. When you begin to save money, it sets up a force field of energy and it triggers the Law of Attraction. As a result you begin to attract to you even more bits of money to add to your savings. And I've spoken to many, many successful people and they've told me the same story. That as soon as you start to put savings aside, it starts to attract into your life and into your work all the money that you need to achieve your goals. The reason why most people retire poor is they never put the initial savings aside to start with. 149 LAWS OF MONEY.

Water consumption in poultry: don't confuse water usage with water consumption.

Water consumption in poultry: don't confuse water usage with water consumption. Water usage is not the same as water consumption. An appreciation and understanding of this important difference is central to effectively managing nipple-type poultry watering systems. Unfortunately, all too many in the poultry industry, including producers, field technical staff and industry suppliers, often fail to appreciate or recognize this distinction and, as a consequence, production results are compromised. see

Corrosion of drinkers in poultry; What causes it and why it’s more of a problem today than ever

In recent years, poultry producers have become increasingly concerned about the threat to their birds from a number of common strains of diseases. To combat this threat, producers often look no further than popular general disinfection agents such as chlorine and bleach to quickly and easily kill and prevent the growth of bacteria and pathogens in the water. Producers may think stainless steel is bullet proof against whatever cleaner they use, but it’s not. Chlorine, bleach and other acid based cleaners have the capacity, when used aggressively, to dissolve the layer of chromium oxide. Once this happens pitting and rust can occur on the ball and seat, compromising the seal and creating leaks. Corrosion: What causes it and why it’s more of a problem today than ever. To avoid costly internal corrosion damage to drinkers, it is important to know how drinkers can be damaged by the misuse of cleaning agents, and to understand which sanitizers need to be avoided and which are appropriate for cleaning the interior stainless steel parts of a drinker. Using oxide-damaging chemicals that cause drinkers to corrode and leak,makes litter gets much wetter, which promotes pathogen growth and increased ammonia release. The house environment becomes less hospitable for raising healthy, robust birds, and producers end up bringing about the very problem they were trying to avoid. . see