Daylength and its impact on turkey welfare and productivity

日长在家禽生产中发挥着重要作用，但对火鸡的研究还不够充分，因此不能预测现代基因型所需的最佳水平。 萨斯喀彻温大学的研究已经确定了日照长度对肉鸡的性能和福利的重要性和影响。反过来，这些信息允许行业和政府制定标准，以满足鸟类的要求，提高福利和生产力。 虽然火鸡在生物学上相似，但它们是不同的属和种，并且具有不同的生产寿命。因此，肉鸡的结果可能不适用于火鸡。例如，我们的研究表明，在肉鸡的短生命周期（31至49天）中，日照长度对福利的影响显着，可以预测，不适当的日照长度对火鸡的不利影响，火鸡的饲养时间要长得多（12至20周），可能会显着更大。因此，这项工作的目标是确定日长对火鸡福利和生产力的影响。 为了使我们能够做到这一点，将使用不同的日照长度水平（14 L：10 D，17 L：7 D，20 L：4 D和23 L：1 D）来建立所有测量变量的响应曲线。 为了帮助回答福利和生产率的问题，回答标准将包括增长率（生产力指标，但也可能给我们关于福利的线索），采食量，饲料效率，死亡率（对生产力和福利的决定都很重要），死亡率的原因（每只被扑杀或死亡的鸟将被张贴死亡原因），鸟群内的流动性（生产力、福利-通过步态评分测量）、行为输出、行为节律、生理节律（褪黑激素）、眼睛大小和重量以及眼睛健康。 对于照明程序，每个实验将包括总共2个房间的重复（每个房间内的性别分开围栏），实验将完成两次以允许适当的重复。 这项研究应该允许行业和政府为加拿大和世界其他地方的火鸡生产制定适当的日照标准。

Daylength plays can play an important role in poultry production, but research on turkeys is not adequate and therefore not predictive of optimum levels required by modern genotypes. Research at the University of Saskatchewan has established the importance and impact of daylength on the performance and welfare of broiler chickens. In turn, this information permitted standards to be set by industry and government that meet the bird's requirements and improve both welfare and productivity. Although biologically similar, turkeys are a different genus and species and have a different production lifespan. Therefore the results in broiler chickens may not hold true in turkeys. For instance, our research demonstrates a significant impact of daylength on welfare in the short life cycle (31 to 49 days) of broiler chickens and it can be predicted that the detrimental impact of improper daylength use on turkeys, which are kept much longer (12 to 20 weeks), could be significantly larger. Therefore, the objective of this work is to determine the impact of daylength on turkey welfare and productivity. To allow us to do this, graded levels of daylength (14L:10D, 17L:7D, 20L:4D and 23L:1D) will be used to establish response curves for all variables measured. To help answer the questions of welfare and productivity, response criteria will include growth rate (productivity measure but may also give us clues regarding welfare), feed intake, feed efficiency, mortality (important for both productivity and welfare determination), the causes of mortality (each bird that is culled or dies will be posted for cause of death), mobility within the flock (productivity, welfare - measured by gait score), behavioural output, behavioural rhythms, physiological rhythms (melatonin), ocular size and weight, and eye health. A total of 2 room replications per experiment for lighting program will be included (sex separate penning within each room), and the experiment will be completed twice to allow appropriate replication. This research should permit industry and government to set appropriate daylength standards for turkey production in Canada and elsewhere in the world.