Occurrence and prevention of chicken pecking

Pecking is caused by the lack of some nutrients, metabolic disorder, abnormal taste or improper feeding management. Feather-pecking, anal-pecking, toe-pecking and egg-pecking of diseased chickens will not only cause unease in the whole flock and affect the growth rate, but also reduce the grade of commercial broilers, increase the loss of eggs and the mortality of chickens, and cause great economic losses to the production and operation of the industry.

1 etiological analysis

1.1 feeding management

If the feeding density is too high, the activity space of the chicken is limited; the temperature of the chicken house is too high, the weather is hot or the humidity is too high, and the heat emission from the chicken body is blocked, which makes the chicken restless; the temperature and relative humidity are too low, which affects the feather growth of the chicken; the light intensity in the house is too strong, and the light color is uncomfortable, which makes the chicken nervous system maintain a high tension. Poor ventilation in the chicken house, excessive harmful gases such as ammonia, hydrogen sulfide and carbon dioxide, which destroy the physiological balance of chickens; insufficient troughs and drinking water utensils, irregular feeding time, and lack of water for too long, all of which can cause struggle during feeding; in addition, the cushion is not suitable, such as the cushion contains sharp wood chips to cause trauma, bedding grass wrapped around the toes, other chicks mistakenly think it is a bug and peck at it. The egg box is insufficient, the hen lays eggs everywhere, and the chicken eating broken eggs can cause egg-eating addiction; in the early stage of egg laying, strong light can tighten the anus, lead to microvascular rupture and bleeding, and cause anal pecking; chickens of different ages, different colors, and different strength are raised in mixed flocks; when molting, the chickens peck and bleed themselves and cause the group to peck.

1.2 Nutrition

Excessive singleness and deficiency of protein in feed; deficiency or imbalance of methionine, lysine, cystine and glycine; deficiency of some vitamins, such as vitamin A, D, E, K and B; deficiency of minerals such as sodium, copper, cobalt, manganese, iron, calcium, phosphorus, sulfur and zinc in feed or imbalance of sodium, potassium, calcium and phosphorus The content of crude fiber in feed is insufficient, while the proportion of feed with high energy volume and small volume is too large, although the metabolic energy after eating is satisfied, but there is no sense of satiety in the crop, and some anti-coccidial drugs are used in feed for a long time.

1.3 pecking habits caused by certain diseases

When coccidiosis, pullorum disease or dyspepsia occurs in chickens, feathers around the anus are adhered and scabbed by fecal dirt, causing feather-pecking and anal-pecking; chickens suffer from parasitic diseases such as feather lice and acaroid mites, and pecking feathers are formed because of itching; trauma occurs in individual chickens; pathogenic or physiological prolapse of anus in hens; tail pecking is easy to be caused in the early stage of infectious bursal disease in chickens. In addition, incorrect beak breaking operation can aggravate the occurrence of pecking habit.

2 comprehensive prevention and control measures

Investigate the cause of the disease, take relevant measures, do everything possible to reduce or eliminate the causes of pecking.

2.1 strengthen feeding management

Strictly control the feeding density, flexibly control the temperature, humidity, light, ventilation and ventilation in the chicken house, strengthen the disinfection of the environment inside and outside the house, provide adequate food trough, drinking utensils and egg laying boxes, feed regularly and quantitatively every day to avoid hunger when full, keep the chicken coop quiet as far as possible, and hang green fodder in the chicken house and sports ground, so as to reduce the chance of chasing and pecking each other. Chickens of different breeds, ages, physiques and colors should not be mixed; high-quality bedding materials should be used to remove all kinds of adverse factors; beak cutting and beak trimming should be done at the age of 7-9 days, with 1 shock 2 for upper beak cutting and 1 gamma 3 for lower beak cutting. From two days before beak cutting, vitamin K and 60mg were added to every kilogram of feed for 5 days to stop bleeding.

2.2 reasonable adjustment of feed composition

According to different varieties and different growth stages, high-quality full-price feed can be fed; when protein is insufficient, some animal protein feed (such as fish meal) or plant protein feed (such as corn protein meal) can be supplemented, but the effect of adding soybean meal is not good; when amino acids such as methionine and cystine are insufficient, 1g methionine can be added to each kilogram feed; vitamin deficiency can supplement the corresponding cod liver oil and multivitamin preparations. If there are insufficient trace elements in the feed, the dosage of trace element premixed powder can be increased appropriately; if the feed sulfur is insufficient, 1% sodium sulfate or 1% sodium sulfate or 2% raw gypsum powder can be added; the salt content in the feed can be increased (0.15%-0.2%) or 0.1% salt water for 2 days; if the proportion of sodium, potassium, calcium and phosphorus is out of balance, it should be adjusted reasonably. If the content of crude fiber in the feed is insufficient, an appropriate amount of bran and grass powder can be added to the feed to make the crude fiber content of the feed reach 3% to 5%.

2.3 do a good job in disease prevention and timely treatment of diseased chickens

Found that pecked chickens and "murderers" should be picked out immediately and kept in isolation so as not to tempt other chickens to chase and peck; apply pecked wounds with odorous drugs, such as iodine tincture, purple medicine, camphor oil and fish gypsum ointment, can effectively prevent them from being pecked again; purify chicken pullorum disease and prevent the occurrence of chicken pullorum disease; do a good job of infectious bursal disease vaccination to prevent tail pecking due to infectious bursal disease In the case of exogenous parasitic diseases, avermectin tablets can be used for feeding; appropriate anti-coccidiosis drugs should be selected to prevent coccidiosis; trauma should be prevented and injured chickens should be isolated in time; scientific feeding and management of laying hens should be done to prevent physiological and pathological prolapse of the anus, and the chickens with prolapse of the anus should be isolated and treated in time.