The outbreak of H7n9 earlier this year led China to temporarily close scores of live poultry markets in an effort to limit the spread of the virus
First H7 viruses have repeatedly been involved in numerous explosive poultry outbreaks including incidents in New york Canada Mexico The netherlands
Also H7 viruses have the ability to mutate from a low pathogenicity form to a high pathogenicity form in birds a scenario that can lead to large-scale culling and ultimately to human exposure to the virus among poultry workers.
#Surviving fasting in the coldking penguin chicks survive harsh winters with almost no food by minimising the cost of energy production.
A new study to be presented at the Society for Experimental Biology meeting in Valencia on the 3rd july shows that the efficiency of the mitochondria the power house of the cell is increased in fasted king penguin chicks.
King penguin chicks are socially and morphologically well adapted to harsh environmental conditions however they experience a severe energy challenge during the cold sub-Antarctic winter
and Prof Damien Roussel at the Ecology of Natural and Man-impacted Hydrosystems laboratory in France looked for the first time at how the king penguin chicks'mitochondria in skeletal muscle the main heat producing tissue in birds function during fasting in the winter.
We found that the efficiency of mitochondrial functioning increased in fasted winter-acclimatized king penguin chicks.
This indicates that less substrate/oxygen was consumed to produce the same amount of energy in the form of ATP showing that mitochondria from fasted chicks adjust its functioning to minimize the cost of energy production.
Their biological adjustments increase survival of chicks which among birds have unrivalled an fasting endurance (up to 5 months).
In this challenging context chicks develop a whole range of energy sparing mechanisms (social huddling behaviour reduction in muscle activity
The research published in Scientific Reports revealed that woodland blue tits that were provided with fat balls as a supplementary food during the winter months went on to produce chicks that were smaller of lower body weight and
which had lower survival than the chicks of birds that did not receive any additional food.
Because these individuals are only capable of raising a small number of chicks they will reduce our estimation of breeding success within the population.
and reproductive success was investigated by checking the nest boxes in the spring to determine the number of eggs laid and the growth and survival of chicks.
if the produce field was within 10 miles of a poultry farm and 64 times more likely
#Why are murdered gull chicks, especially on Sundays? Why are murdered gull chicks especially on Sundays? How does man influence the size of gull populations?
These and many other questions are answered in the doctoral thesis of Kees Camphuysen from the Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research NIOZ.
Camphuysen also discovered a remarkable rhythm in the growth of the chicks and also that much more cannibalism took place over the weekend than on weekdays (gull chicks that were pecked to death by adult gulls and sometimes eaten).
It turned out that gulls especially during chick care rely heavily on fish waste thrown overboard from fishing boats.
Bad luck for these birds: at the weekend the fishing fleet is largely in the harbour.
This weekly rhythm is a problem especially in the second half of the chick care period (in July)
when there is barely enough food to be found for the hungry chicks. The fleet is expected to shrink even more in the coming years.
Although the majority of these attacks (78%)were carried out against poultry sheep depredation resulted in higher economic losses.
Wouter Van dongen and colleagues at the Vetmeduni Vienna have examined the gastrointestinal bacteria of chick and adult black-legged kittiwakes.
Surprisingly the microbial assemblages of chicks and adults generally differ greatly with only a few types of bacteria in common.
From a youthful hodgepodge to a stable communitythere turned out to be a great variety of bacterial species in the guts of kittiwake chicks
Astonishingly the sampled chicks and adults had only seven out of a total of 64 bacteria species in common
and some of the bacteria that were very common in adults were not present in chicks at all.
Wouter Van dongen says We were surprised very to find that the bacteria in chick gastrointestinal tracts are so different from those in adults.
Given that chicks share the nest with their parents and eat food that is regurgitated by the parents we expected the level of bacterial sharing to be a lot higher.
Nuts game poultry and fish are included also as well as whole grains rapeseed oil and low-fat dairy products.
if the chicks he's feeding are really his? Depending on the species males have different strategies.
Herbert Hoi and colleagues of the University of Veterinary medicine Vienna together with scientists from the Slovak Academy of Sciences Bratislava carried out experiments with reed warblers to see how a situation of potential infidelity affects later paternal investment in the chicks
The scientists then observed nest building activity and feeding of offspring and determined chick paternity through DNA analyses.
Those females that had been observed to show interest in the intruder were also later found to be more likely to have extra-pair chicks in their nest.
Males seem to readily procure food for the chicks regardless whether they are their own or not.
because he cannot distinguish his own from an extra-pair chick. On the other hand females who perceived their males as unable to repel an intruder quickly enough
#Bird flu in live poultry markets are the source of viruses causing human infectionson 31 march 2013 the Chinese National Health and Family planning Commission announced human cases of novel
Following analysis of H7n9 influenza viruses collected from live poultry markets it was found that these viruses circulating among birds were responsible for human infections.
A total of 970 samples were collected from live poultry markets and poultry farms located in Shanghai and Anhui Province.
Samples analyzed included drinking water feces contaminated soil and cloacal and tracheal swabs. Of these samples 20 were positive for the presence of H7n9 influenza viruses.
All of the positive samples originated from live poultry markets in Shanghai. Of these 20 positive samples 10 were isolated from chickens 3 from pigeons
We suggest that strong measures such as continued surveillance of avian and human hosts control of animal movement shutdown of live poultry markets
and culling of poultry in affected areas should be taken during this initial stage of virus prevalence to prevent a possible pandemic.
#Poultry drug increases levels of toxic arsenic in chicken meatchickens likely raised with arsenic-based drugs result in chicken meat that has higher levels of inorganic arsenic a known carcinogen according to a new study
whether or not the poultry was raised with arsenical drugs. The findings provide evidence that arsenical use in chickens poses public health risks
and known as roxarsone was readily available to poultry companies that wished to add it to their Feed in addition to inorganic arsenic the researchers were able to identify residual roxarsone in the meat they studied;
Arsenic-based drugs have been used in poultry production for decades. Arsenical drugs are approved to make poultry grow faster
and improve the pigmentation of the meat. The drugs are approved also to treat and prevent parasites in poultry.
In 2010 industry representatives estimated that 88 percent of the roughly nine billion chickens raised for human consumption in the U s. received roxarsone.
Currently in the U s. there is no federal law prohibiting the sale or use of arsenic-based drugs in poultry feed.
and adding in estimations of poultry production and consumption which are used to infer future risk
The distribution of potentially infected poultry was included also in the model. The majority of early cases of H7n9 were found in Shanghai
but Shanghai is not a big poultry exporter so the model shows limited transmission via this route.
In contrast Jiangsu distributes poultry to Shanghai Zhejiang and beyond. Prof Jiming Liu who led the study explained By basing our model on wild bird migration
and distribution of potentially infected poultry we are able to produce a time line of the estimated risk of human infection with H7n9.
Since the effect of poultry-to-poultry infection is understood not really it may become necessary to regulate the activity of poultry markets.
The restricted foods included grains beans fruit poultry and plants belonging to the nightshade family
Due to the changing climate of the past decades the egg laying dates of Parus major have become increasingly mismatched with the timing of the main food source for its chicks:
although fewer offspring now fledge due to food shortage each of these chicks has a higher chance of survival until the next breeding season.
Out of 10 eggs laid 9 chicks are born 7 fledge and on average only one chick survives winter.
That last number increases with less competitors around. This is the first time that density dependence--a widespread phenomenon in nature
The community with the most double cropping also has a soy processing plant that employs thousands of workers as well as complementary poultry
With H7n9 we are already seeing marked falls in demand for poultry and this can have a major effect on the livelihoods of the rural poor who depend on the sale of chickens for a significant part of their disposable income.
and others associated with the poultry industry are massive and there will be a need to look for alternative means of support for these producers.
At present many farmers cannot sell their poultry and ways need to be found to support these farmers
which already covers Jiangsu Zhejiang and Anhui provinces and beyond support for taking up alternative jobs should be considered for households rearing poultry
so that households can make up for their losses from raising poultry and maintain their living standards.
despite shifts in government policies towards support for large scale industrial poultry production small scale production still needs support as it is a major source of income for women and the rural poor.
and infecting poultry. This means that for areas where this virus is not yet present farm biosecurity measures need to be strengthened as recommended also by FAO
which all poultry in a large zone around known infected flocks are culled had very severe effects on livelihoods because of the level of disruption
and N components of this virus were derived probably from wild birds and also possibly from poultry.
and poultry and it is important to assess the likelihood of this through scientific studies on wild birds as they fly north through China to their summer breeding grounds.
a moderate consumption of wine dairy products and poultry and a low consumption of red meat sweet beverages creams and pastries.
adults raise just one or two chicks to maturity every 10 years making hunting unsustainable.
and crush chicks as the birds often nest in agricultural fields. Pesticides kill protein-rich insects that bustard chicks rely on for rapid growth to be able to migrate come fall.
Rapid development in Central asia combined with climate change and low reproductive rate could make these birds disappear Kessler says.
but the mechanism at the molecular level has not been clear says Jun-Lin Guan Ph d. the senior author of the FIP200 paper
Abnormally higher levels of ROS can cause neural stem cells to start differentiating Guan is a professor in the Molecular Medicine & Genetics division of the U-M Department of Internal medicine and in the Department of Cell & Developmental Biology.
Guan has been studying the role of FIP200 --whose full name is focal adhesion kinase family interacting protein of 200 kd--in cellular biology for more than a decade.
Several years ago Guan's team stumbled upon clues that FIP200 might be important in neural stem cells when studying an entirely different phenomenon.
what we were actually intending to study says Guan as it suggested that without FIP200 something was causing damage to the home of neural stem cells that normally replace nerve cells during injury or aging.
It's clear that autophagy is going to be important in various types of stem cells says Guan pointing to the new paper in Autophagy that lays out
Guan's own research is now exploring the downstream effects of defects in neural stem cell autophagy--for instance how communication between neural stem cells
whether the presence of an audience influences the behaviour and the testosterone changes of Japanese quails (Coturnix japonica) after a fight.
#Poultry probiotic cuts its coat to beat bad bacteriaa strain of probiotic bacteria that can fight harmful bacterial infections in poultry has the ability to change its coat according to new findings from the Institute of Food Research.
The probiotic is currently being taken forward through farm-scale trials to evaluate how well it combats Clostridium perfringens--a cause of necrotic enteritis in poultry and the second most common cause of food poisoning in the UKTHE researchers at IFR
when given to young chicks prevents the colonisation of C. perfringens. Now in research published in the journal PLOS ONE they have found that the probiotic bacteria have the ability to alter their coat.
Understanding the role of the slime capsule coat will inform the commercial development of this strain as a preventative treatment for C. perfringens infection in poultry especially in regard to how the probiotic is stored and produced.
As there is a growing pressure to reduce the use of antibiotics in farming new products are needed to maintain animal welfare standards reduce the huge costs of necrosis in poultry
Their diet should include cereals fruit vegetables dairy products lean meats fish poultry eggs and nuts.
#Research documents lesser prairie chickenstexas Tech University scientists have been at the forefront of research on the lesser prairie chicken (LPC) a prairie grouse native to the West Texas landscape for more than three decades.
Additional research out of Oklahoma and Kansas has indicated lesser prairie chickens have an aversion to tall vertical structures such as wind turbines
and the number of lesser prairie chickens has decreased about 90 percent in the past 100 years. The bird is now found only in restricted areas of five states in the southern Great plains:
Hence the prairie chickens tend to stay away from areas where there are tall structures. Blake Grisham a post doctoral research associate working with Boal said in terms of wind farms companies already have been trying to do the right thing by staying away from known habitats.
Those spots do occur where they overlap with the distribution of the lesser prairie chickens; we've been fortunate that the wind energy companies have identified these places as potential problems
Boal said prairie chickens for example are not very likely to use cotton fields to nest in or for lekking (places where males aggregate to try to attract females to mate with).
Prairie chickens have evolved in this landscape Boal said. They have a breeding strategy that is suited to this landscape a boom
If the prairie chicken has a bad year they may have to expand their home range and forage over a greater area.
and the relative risk that a species is facing we need to look at those risks across its distribution not just have a one-size-fits-all for the prairie chicken's entire distribution.
The state of the lesser prairie chicken is an indicator of prairie health he said. A general decline shows that the ecosystem as a whole faces uncertainty
What people need to understand is that it's not just prairie chickens. It's really the inter-connectedness of these biotic communities Boal said.
When we have indicators like a prairie chicken and there's something going wrong that's an indication of that biotic community as a whole.
Prairie chickens are an important component of that land and their future depends on the quality of stewardship they receive.
Observing genome-wide rapid evolution for both falcons chicken zebra finch and turkey researchers found that the nervous system olfaction
The black stripe across her breast and white patches on her cheeks correlate to a chick's weight at two weeks
and the latter can affect an'adopted'chick's health suggesting nurture is involved. Taking two mothers with different patterning
and swapping their chicks researchers from Palacky University in the Czech republic were able to investigate the growth and health of the infants and the'ornamentation'of their mothers.
and found a correlation between the chick's weight at two weeks and the size of black breast stripe on the genetic mother.
The immaculateness of both genetic and foster mother's white cheek patch was related to the strength of chick's immune response suggesting that this was due to both nurture and genetics.
In contrast the body size of a chick was related only to the body size of its genetic mother and not to ornamentation at all.
Global Change Biology published a study conducted by Warren with Ph d. candidate Lacy Chick of the University of Tennessee-Knoxville.
She points out that meat poultry and seafood are the most expensive items in a food budget especially the recommended lower-fat versions.
#Putting the clock in cock-a-doodle-dooof course roosters crow with the dawn. But are they simply reacting to the environment
That's because other things--a car's headlights for instance--will set a rooster off too at any time of day.
To find out whether the roosters'crowing is driven by an internal biological clock Yoshimura and his colleague Tsuyoshi Shimmura placed birds under constant light conditions and turned on recorders to listen and watch.
Under round-the-clock dim lighting the roosters kept right on crowing each morning just before dawn proof that the behavior is entrained to a circadian rhythm.
The roosters'reactions to external events also varied over the course of the day. In other words predawn crowing
and the crowing that roosters do in response to other cues both depend on a circadian clock.
The findings are just the start of the team's efforts to unravel the roosters'innate vocalizations
--and use the researchers'models to identify other hotspots--for increased monitoring of flu in humans livestock poultry and wild birds.
These findings predicting potential outbreak sites can help decision-makers prioritize the most important areas where people poultry
While the World health organization has identified six countries as hosts to ongoing widespread bird flu infections in poultry in 2011--China Egypt India Vietnam Indonesia
The scientists had to identify indicators of flu outbreaks such as dense poultry populations or rain and temperatures that encourage flu transmission.
It is of course feasible for people to diversity their diets to increase the consumption of other selenium-rich foods such as meat poultry fish
Red meat and poultry provide the majority of zinc in the American diet according to the National institutes of health.
#Worlds oldest-known wild bird hatches another chicka Laysan albatross known as Wisdom--believed to be at least 62 years old--has hatched a chick on Midway Atoll National Wildlife
During the morning hours on Sunday Feb 3 the chick was observed pipping its way into the world by U s. Fish
and Wildlife Service biologist Pete Leary who said the chick appears healthy. Wisdom was banded first in 1956
Bruce Peterjohn chief of the North american Bird Banding Program at the USGS Patuxent Wildlife Research center in Laurel MD said Wisdom has raised likely at least 30 to 35 chicks during her breeding life though the number
and raise the chick. After consecutive years in which they have raised successfully and fledged a chick the parents may take the occasional next year off from parenting.
Wisdom is known to have nested in 2006 and then every year since 2008. As Wisdom rewrites the record books she provides new insights into the remarkable biology of seabirds Peterjohn said.
Present threats to the birds include lead poisoning of chicks on Midway from lead paint used in previous decades;
The birds ingest large amounts of marine debris--by some estimates 5 tons of plastic are fed unknowingly to albatross chicks each year by their parents.
Although the plastic may not kill the chicks directly it reduces their food intake which leads to dehydration
which prey on chicks nesting adults and eggs. Albatross evolved on islands where land mammals were absent
because it is composed of just three herbivores in the winter--the wild Svalbard reindeer (Rangifer tarandus platyrhynchus) the Svalbard rock ptarmigan (Lagopus muta hyperborea)
and the sibling vole (Microtus levis) and one shared consumer the arctic fox (Vulpes lagopus). The community's population fluctuations were driven mainly by rain-on-snow events the researchers found.
and also reduces food accessibility for the rock ptarmigan and sibling vole populations causing extensive simultaneous population crashes in all three species in the winter and spring after the extreme weather.
#Poultry vaccination responsible for dramatic fall in Salmonella infectionsmass poultry vaccination programmes introduced to combat Salmonella infections have led to a dramatic fall in the number of cases since the late 1990s according to a researcher at the University of Liverpool.
A raft of control measures were introduced into the poultry industry including movement restrictions compulsory slaughter
Code of Practicelegislation requiring compulsory slaughter of poultry infected with Salmonella has now been revoked but the mass vaccination of poultry has continued by those breeders subscribing to the Lion Quality Code of Practice
and using the Lion Mark on eggs. The code of practice requires mandatory vaccination of all young hens destined to lay Lion eggs against Salmonella as well as traceability of hens eggs
Sarah O'brien Professor of Epidemiology and Zoonoses from the University's Institute of Infection and Global Health attributes a dramatic fall in the number of Salmonella cases in humans to this mass vaccination programme in poultry.
The sweets and dairy pattern was characterized by the largest proportions of energy from baked goods milk sweetened coffee and tea and dairy-based desserts and the lowest intakes of poultry.
The health-conscious pattern was characterized by relatively higher intakes of pasta noodles rice whole fruit poultry nuts fish and vegetables and lower intakes of fried vegetables processed meats
But the consumption in poultry and pets has increased also. Distributed by species pigs account for around 78%of antimicrobial use in 2013 cattle 10%aquaculture 3%poultry 1%fur animals 4
%and pets horses and other companion animals the remaining 3%.Increased use in pigs and poultryantimicrobial consumption in pigs measured in doses has increased in all three age groups:
In 2013 antimicrobial consumption in poultry increased by 57%compared to the year before. This is partly because of the wet winter
which led to more illness and--as a result--an increased consumption of tetracyclines in turkeys.
Antimicrobial consumption in poultry is generally low compared to other species. It accounts for only 1%of the total use.
Cephalosporins are used not in poultry production. Companion animals and horsesoverall the consumption of antimicrobials in the treatment of companion animals
which is common in pig and poultry diets. Furthermore salmon today is fed with fishmeal from wild caught fish
The findings are part of a seven-year study conducted by Prof Dabo Guan of UEA's School of International Development and an international research team.
Prof Guan professor of climate change economics said: Capital investment creates a market demand for the large-scale production expansion of cement steel
Prof Guan said: The efficiency improvements are largely due to diminishing investments in emission-intensive industries
Additionally Prof Guan has published recently research in Environmental science & Technology which shows China's growing economy has caused also serious stresses on the country's freshwater both in terms of consumption and pollution.
Prof Guan and a team of researchers found that 75 per cent of China's lakes
Prof Guan said: Urban household consumption export of goods and services and infrastructure investment are the main factors contributing to accumulated water pollution since 2000.
and beef turkey and lamb followed respectively. Goose was the least common meat species detected.
beef goat lamb chicken goose turkey pork and horse. Pet food safety was another area of concern particularly with pet foods that are formulated specifically to address food allergies in both cats and dogs continued Dr. Hellberg.
and other poultry species now consume 70 to 90 percent of all genetically engineered crops according to the new UC Davis review.
and poultry that have eaten GE feed would require supply-chain segregation and traceability as the products themselves would not differ in any way that could be detected.
#Captive whooping cranes released into the wildfour whooping crane chicks raised in captivity began their integration into the wild Saturday as part of the continuing effort to increase the wild population of this endangered species. The cranes hatched
The chicks about six-months old are part of an experimental rearing and release method referred to as parent-rearing.
The parent-reared whooping crane chicks were hatched and raised by captive adult whooping cranes. This method relies entirely on the expertise of captive parents who care for exercise
and feed the chicks. These chicks will join a flock of about 95 cranes that inhabit wetlands on the refuge and elsewhere in central Wisconsin during the spring and summer.
The flock is composed of cranes reintroduced into the wild in order to establish a migratory flock of whooping cranes in the eastern United states. The Eastern Migratory Flock flies south to wetlands in the Southeast United states for the winter.
The USGS Patuxent Wildlife Research center also raises chicks for release into a newly established nonmigratory flock in the wetlands of Southwest Louisiana.
Over the past 13 years USGS biologists--dressed in costumes to avoid having the birds imprint on people--have raised between five and 20 whooping crane chicks annually that have been released into the Eastern Migratory Flock said John French leader of the USGS whooping crane
This new method of allowing captive adult cranes rear the chicks prior to release into the wild is intended to evaluate the effects of rearing by humans in costume which is obviously an odd condition.
Parent rearing may result in the chicks learning behavior important to their survival and reproduction.
The parent-reared chicks arrived at Necedah NWR Saturday where they were housed in separate predator resistant enclosures to provide them a safe place for chicks to roost
The pens are located in the vicinity of pairs of adult whooping cranes without chicks of their own. Such pairs have a tendency to adopt other chicks
and when adopted will lead them south during migration which begins at the end of October. In addition to the four parent-reared chicks released at Necedah NWR seven costumed-reared whooping crane chicks will join the eastern migratory flock this year as well.
The chicks were raised in captivity by costumed handlers and have been imprinted on an ultralight aircraft. They will earn the migration route by following the ultralight from White river Marsh in Wisconsin to the Gulf Coast of Florida.
More information on the migration will be available when it begins in October. All of the releases of whooping cranes in Wisconsin add to the Eastern Migratory Flock a reintroduction project undertaken by a broad coalition of Federal state
Overtext Web Module V3.0 Alpha
Copyright Semantic-Knowledge, 1994-2011