What to Do About Bronchial Blockage in Broiler Chickens? A Detailed Guide to Prevention and Treatment

Although the prices and market conditions for broiler chickens are quite good right now, broiler chickens are still poultry and can contract all kinds of infectious diseases just like other poultry. Moreover, to save space, farmers actually raise broiler chickens at fairly high densities, which further increases the likelihood of disease outbreaks.

What to Do About Bronchial Blockage in Broiler Chickens?

Bronchial blockage in broiler chickens is mainly caused by poor routine hygiene. This condition is a multi-cause respiratory complex. In daily practice, it is important to keep things clean, remove manure promptly, and disinfect regularly. The house should be dry, with attention paid to ventilation; at the same time, reduce stocking density, balance nutrition, reduce stress, improve resistance, and minimize the triggers of disease as much as possible.

1. Pay attention to ventilation in the chicken house

Improve air quality and reduce dust through ventilation. Before 20 days of age, ventilate with caution and closely monitor coordination with temperature; intermittent ventilation can be used as conditions require. In standardized chicken houses, if ventilation is needed in the early stage, exhaust fans can be used to draw air outward. In ordinary chicken houses, avoid cold air blowing directly onto the flock during ventilation.

2. Pay attention to air humidity inside the house

Humidity in the chicken house is very important. After 3 days, humidity should be maintained between 45%—60%. Warm water with disinfectant can be added for spraying to keep the air moist and reduce harmful substances in the air. When spraying, be careful to maintain the temperature inside the house and avoid a temperature drop caused by spraying.

3. Avoid strong stress reactions

Avoid the occurrence of cold stress, especially at night and during ventilation. For 3 days before and after vaccination, add multivitamins and cod liver oil to the drinking water. After vaccine immunization, add drugs against mycoplasma infection to the drinking water to prevent respiratory diseases.

4. Vaccine immunization

Scientific and reasonable immunization is an important measure for preventing viral diseases. Vaccination should be done carefully to avoid missed immunizations. The inoculation method for freeze-dried vaccines is intranasal and intraocular administration (some chicken farms only perform drinking-water immunization, ignoring immunization of the nasal mucosa, resulting in insufficient immune protection).

Treatment Plan for Bronchial Blockage in Broiler Chickens

1. According to the specific condition of the chickens and their age in days, calculate the medication plan for bronchial blockage. Generally, before 10 days of age, use drugs that relieve exterior symptoms and resolve phlegm to relieve the blockage and eliminate thick, sticky phlegm. Usually provide medicated drinking water for 6-8 hours so that every chicken drinks the medicine. In addition, if there is a respiratory problem, it needs to be used together with anti-mycoplasma drugs or doxycycline.

2. After 20 days of age, based on treatment experience, there is generally some degree of viral problem, so it needs to be used together with antiviral drugs. It will be better if combined with potent components or azithromycin components.

3. Reduce fever. Chickens with bronchial blockage will more or less have body fever, and reducing fever is key!

4. Supplement energy. During the disease period, chickens have a greater need for trace elements and vitamins. Some chickens even stop eating and drinking, and medication alone is of no help. At this time, using glucose and VC will achieve twice the result with half the effort.

Scientific Management of Broiler Chickens

Compared with scattered backyard farming by farmers, large-scale chicken meat farming is more conducive to scientific and systematic management, facilitates the timely introduction and application of new technologies, and can greatly reduce costs and improve the production efficiency of livestock and poultry products. At the same time, large-scale farming ensures product quality and food safety by establishing a complete whole-process quality control and food safety monitoring system. China's broiler industry has also adopted strict process control in processing, logistics, and sales. By controlling product temperature, microorganisms, physicochemical indicators, and other factors, it ensures food safety during the chicken meat processing process; by establishing a logistics and distribution “cold chain” system, it ensures the freshness and hygiene of chicken meat products; and by strengthening self-inspection and self-control capabilities, it ensures food safety throughout the entire “from farm to table” process for chicken meat products.

Secrets to Fast Growth in Broiler Chickens

1. Optimize breeds

The rapid growth of broiler chickens mainly benefits from the continuous optimization and improvement of chicken breeds. Many domestic and international breeding companies and research institutions have long been engaged in research and selective breeding of broiler chicken breeds, continuously developing new breeds with excellent characteristics, such as large body size and fast growth.

2. Scientific feed formulas

Different feeding plans should be formulated for different stages. From chicks to market, broiler chickens have different nutrient requirements at different growth and development stages. Modern farming technology scientifically proportions raw materials such as corn, soybean meal, oils, vitamins, amino acids, and minerals according to the characteristics and nutritional needs of each growth stage of broiler chickens, providing scientific feed formulas suitable for each stage, thereby providing the material basis for healthy and rapid growth of broiler chickens.

3. Effective disease prevention and epidemic prevention measures

It is necessary to create a clean and pollution-free growth environment for chickens, along with strict disease prevention and control measures. To avoid invasion and interference from external viruses, most broiler farming enterprises are located in remote villages or sparsely populated mountainous areas. In addition, from birth to market, broiler chickens all undergo vaccine immunization, ensuring healthy growth.

4. Standardized chicken farm facilities

The chicken house where broiler chickens grow is a fully enclosed environment with automatic temperature and humidity control, a 24-hour ventilation system, automatic water supply, and automatic feed supply, which provides a stable, comfortable, and growth-suitable environment for the chickens.

5. Scientific feeding and management

Establish procedures for lighting, feeding, water supply, and ventilation that conform to the growth patterns of broiler chickens, as well as staged rearing according to flock growth patterns, ensuring rapid and healthy growth of broiler chickens from chick to market.

The Breeding Cycle of Broiler Chickens

In a year and a half, a hen can produce about 150 offspring, a sow can produce about 20 offspring, and a cow can produce only 1 offspring in a year and a half to two years. Compared with pigs and cattle, the ratio of chickens in terms of one generation of selection is 150:20:1. This is enough to allow chickens, during genetic selection, to select the best breeds from more offspring, far outperforming pigs and cattle in terms of genetic breeding progress.

During the process of raising broiler chickens, farmers must constantly pay attention to the growth condition of the broiler chickens. If anything seems wrong with the broiler chickens, they should promptly identify the problem and seek the best solution to solve it quickly, striving to minimize losses.