The effect of a single or repeated period of high stocking density on the behavior and response to stimuli in broiler chickens

School of Agricultural and Forest Sciences, University of Wales, Bangor, Gwynedd, United Kingdom.

Broiler chickens are normally housed at a fixed number per unit area throughout their life, which reduces their opportunity for movement during the later stages of rearing. An experiment is described that exposed broilers to a high stocking density either once or twice in the rearing period, and investigated the effects on the birds' behavior, and the response to other birds and humans after the second exposure to high or low stocking density. The stocking density was increased from a low level (1.7 kg/m2) to a high level (14 kg/m2) for the 2nd and/or 4th wk of rearing, or left unchanged at the low level. When stocked at the low rate, the birds spent more time walking and sitting and less time dozing and sleeping. They pecked more at inanimate objects and interacted more with other birds, but this did not include aggressive interaction. The effects of stocking density on behavior were greater in Week 4 than in Week 2, but there was no evidence that exposure to a high stocking density in Week 2 influenced the birds' behavioral response to a high stocking density in Week 4. Where stocking density did affect behavior in both Weeks 2 and 4, there was evidence of the response being cumulative. The activity of birds in the presence of another bird restrained in an open field arena was greatest when they had been stocked at the low density throughout the experiment. When a familiar person was in the arena, the birds that had been stocked at the high density in Week 2 were most active, but these birds showed the longest tonic immobility when inverted in a cradle. It is concluded that a high stocking density reduces activity in broiler chickens, and that birds stocked at a high density early in the rearing period are most active in the presence of people and show the longest tonic immobility in response to a fearful stimulus.

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