Performing Department
Animal Science
Non Technical Summary
Organic poultry farming is an increasingly popular and sustainable method of poultry production that prioritizes animal welfare, environmental protection, and product quality. Despite its potential benefits and rapid growth, organic poultry farming faces several challenges, including disease management, feed availability, efficiency, food safety, and marketing. This multi-regional, multi-institutional, and multidisciplinary proposal aims to develop evidence-based recommendations for improving organic poultry farming practices, focusing on four broad research areas namely (1) microbial safety, (2) gut health and production efficiency (3) product quality, and (4) consumer perception including cost. Project results will be disseminated to scientific groups, the community, organic poultry producers, and stakeholders through conferences, workshops, social media, and webinars. Moreover, instructional material and an online certificate program will be developed to train the next generation of the workforce in organic poultry production and share the findings of the project after the life of the grant. The program staff consists of a combination of young, mid-career, and senior scientists with expertise in poultry production, poultry microbiology, poultry nutrition, poultry economics, poultry processing, product quality, turkey production, food safety, and extension. Taken together, the integrated research, extension, and education activities will improve the sustainability and viability of organic poultry production to meet the food security challenges in the USA and globally.
Animal Health Component
0%
Research Effort Categories
Basic
30%
Applied
70%
Developmental
(N/A)
Goals / Objectives
The long-term goals of this multi-regional, multi-institutional proposal integrating research, extension, and education is to provide organic poultry producers with innovative, economical, effective and easy to implement strategies for improving the microbial safety, production efficiency, quality, economics and consumer perception in organic poultry farming. The proposal has a total of 11 objectives (6 research, 3 outreach, 2 education). Specific research objectives based on the 4 stakeholder needs are presented below:Stakeholders need 1: Microbial safety of organic poultry and poultry products.Objective 1. Reduce Salmonella and Campylobacter jejuni colonization in organic poultry by in-ovo vaccination of developing embryos.Objective 2. Reduce Salmonella and Campylobacter jejuni in farm and processing environment by application of phytochemical emulsions and encapsulated probiotics.Objective 3. Reduce Salmonella and Campylobacter jejuni colonization in organic poultry by supplementation of drinking water with phytochemical emulsions and encapsulated probiotics.Stakeholders need 2: Gut health and production efficiency in organic poultry.Objective 4. Improve gut health and production efficiency in organic poultry by supplementation of drinking water with phytochemical emulsions and encapsulated probiotics (Lab and field trials).Stakeholders need 3: Product quality and consumer acceptability.Objective 5. Study quality, and consumer acceptability of eggs and broiler carcass obtained from organic poultry supplemented with phytochemical emulsions and encapsulated probiotics.Stakeholders need 4: Consumer perception and cost-benefit analysis.Objective 6. Cost/benefit and consumer perception analysis on the research, extension and education efforts of the project.We will develop a comprehensive outreach program to disseminate the findings of the proposal to avian health professionals, organic poultry farmers and other stakeholders. The project results will be disseminated by a team of young and experienced poultry outreach specialists (4 participating faculty) and stakeholders who have been involved in organic poultry production. The outreach/extension objectives of this proposal are presented below. Please note that the objective numbers are a continuation from research objectives above to maintain continuity and clarity.Objective 7. Disseminate project results to scientific community through conferences, symposia and webinars.Objective 8. Conduct outreach to the organic poultry community, extension specialists and interested stakeholders through focus group meetings, social media, and workshops.Objective 9. Measure the impact of outreach efforts through surveys and post-program evaluations.Objective 10. Develop instructional materials and incorporate into existing university curriculum.Objective 11. Develop an online certificate program focusing on organic poultry production.
Project Methods
Obj.1. ReduceSalmonellaandCampylobacter jejunicolonization in organic poultry byin-ovovaccination of developing embryos.A total of 225 fertilized eggs (Cornish cross) will be incubated. On day 18 of incubation, the eBeam-killed-multi-strainor formalin-killed-multi-strainvaccines will be delivered to the embryos as per their groups byin ovoinjection into the amnion. On the day of hatch, the chicks hatched in each treatment group will be placed in individual rearing pens. On day 7, 5 birds from each group will be euthanized, and serum will be collected to measure antibody titer (reflects degree of protection against pathogen). The remaining birds (20 chickens/group) will then be challenged via oral gavage on day 8. After the challenge, 5 birds per group will be euthanized on days 14, 21, and 28for pathogen enumeration in organs.Obj. 2. ReduceSalmonellaandCampylobacter jejunisurvival in farm and processing environment by application of phytochemical emulsions and encapsulated probiotics.The coupons (stainless steel, rubber and PVC plastic) will be individually placed in each well of sterile polystyrene plates followed by addition of 1 ml of specific culture broth medium containingS.Enteritidis orC. jejuni(~ 6.0 Log CFU). The coupons will be incubated aerobically at 10, or 25°C for 48 h to facilitate biofilm formation. Following incubation, the broth will be removed, and coupons will be gently rinsed with 1 ml PBS in the well. Thereafter, 1 ml of 0, 0.25, 0.5 or 1% of phytochemical (TC, CR, EG, LN) emulsions will be added with a contact time of 1, 5, 10, or 15 min. After phytochemical treatment, the coupons will be tested to enumerate the number of surviving pathogens in the biofilm.Obj. 3. ReduceSalmonellaandCampylobacter jejunicolonization in organic poultry by supplementation of drinking water with phytochemical emulsions and encapsulated probiotics.A total of 240 nineteen-week and 240 forty-week-oldSalmonella-free White leghorn hens will be procured.The birds from each age group will be randomly allocated to probiotic or phytochemical emulsion treatments administeredfor 60 days. On day 14, the birds will be challenged withS.Enteritidis by crop gavage. After 7 days of challenge (day 21 of the trial), eggs will be collected daily from each treatment group and tested for presence or absence of SE until day 60-end of trial. On day 60 of trial, birds from all treatment groups will be euthanized. Cecum, oviduct and liver samples from the birds will be collected for pathogen detection. Similar design will be used to study the effect of phytochemicals and probiotics on pathogen colonization in turkeys and broilers.Obj.4. Improve gut health and production efficiency in organic poultry by supplementation of drinking water with phytochemical emulsions and encapsulated probiotics (Lab and field trials).White Leghorns (34-week-old) will be utilized in the study. There will be 12 replicate hens per treatment, assigned randomly to treatment groups to understand the apparent ileal digestibility (crude protein, amino acids, and metabolizable energy). Birds will be individually housed in PVC coated wire cages. The study will beconducted for 3-week period withad libitumfeed and water. Acid insoluble ash (AIA) (Celite, 2%) added to each diet will be utilized as digestibility marker in feed during the experimental period. Digesta and excreta collection will be performed followed by proximate analysis.Based on the nutrient digestibility study (feeding study I), experimental treatments for on-farm trial will be generated by narrowing down to the top three performing additives.Similar design will be followed at University of Minnesota to perform experiments with Turkeys.Obj.5. Study quality, and consumer acceptability of eggs and broiler carcass obtained from organic poultry supplemented with phytochemical emulsions and encapsulated probiotics. Sensory analysis of meat will be performed by trained sensory panels to assess consumer acceptability and intensity of overall impression, flavor, juiciness and tenderness using 9 point hedonic and 5-point just about right scales. Sensory analysis of eggs will be performed byconsumer triangle tests to determine if consumers can detect a difference between the control eggs and the eggs subjected to the phytochemical or probiotics treatments. The effect of phytochemical emulsion and probiotic supplementation on the chicken meat and egg quality during refrigerated storage will be determined.Obj.6. Cost/benefit and consumer perception analysis on the research, extension and education efforts of the project.There are two sub-objectives associated with this objective. Sub-objective 1 will study the benefits and costs of the strategies. Comparison of the economic benefits and costs will be evaluated using a benefit cost analysis using a standard budgeting technique. This will capture the economic costs of the implements including the intervention, changes in time associated with growth, or other changes in the input side of production. Sub-objective 2 will develop a survey to understand the impact of the project's innovative strategies (in-ovovaccination, phytochemical emulsions, probiotics) on producers and consumers.Obj.7. Disseminate project results to scientific community through conferences, symposia and webinars.Extension and outreach activities will be conducted to help organic producers and industry stakeholders make their operations profitable and sustainable. To that end, in the first year, stakeholder advisory panel along with extension co-PDs will be invited to meet with the organic poultry producers across the participating states to discuss appropriate dissemination of results. These discussions will be used to identify areas for improvement and discussed with the research and education teams to further develop a comprehensive outreach program.Obj.8. Conduct outreach to the organic poultry community, extension specialists and interested stakeholders through focus group meetings, social media, and workshops.The extension team in collaboration with regional partners and stakeholder advisory panel will provide workshops for poultry farmers to disseminate the research findings. Workshops and hands-on activities will be used as tools to facilitate effective learning in participants.Obj.9. Measure the impact of outreach efforts through surveys and post program evaluations.UConn, UKY, and UMN will develop surveys to understand the impact and needs of organic poultry producers on food safety, nutrition and health, animal welfare, and the well-being of birds, human health, and environmental health. Follow-up assessments such as post-program evaluations will be distributed to participants at meetings and other direct contact programs.Obj.10. Develop instructional materials and incorporate into existing university curriculum.The research conducted from obj #1-6, will provide additional material on impact of novel strategies on organic poultry production. The research data will be developed into teachable curriculum and integrated into current Poultry courses taught at the participating institutions.Obj.11. Develop an online certificate program focusing on organic poultry production.Online certificate course:The course will be implemented first at UConn and will be modified for use by other collaborating Universities and/or extension/outreach professionals across the country. This certificate course will be designed on the Blackboard eLearn platform.The certificate course will be equivalent to a 1 credit course for university students with 12-14 hours' worth of class material.