Poultry farms are an important contributor to the human food chain. Worldwide, humankind keeps an enormous number of domesticated birds (e.g. chickens) for their eggs and their meat, providing rich sources of low-fat protein. However, around the world, there have been growing concerns about the quality of life for the livestock in poultry farms; and increasingly vocal demands for improved standards of animal welfare. Recent advances in sensing technologies and machine learning allow the possibility of automatically assessing the health of some individual birds, and employing the lessons learned to improve the welfare for all birds. This task superficially appears to be easy, given the dramatic progress in recent years in classifying human behaviors, and given that human behaviors are presumably more complex. However, as we shall demonstrate, classifying chicken behaviors poses several unique challenges, chief among which is creating a generalizable "dictionary" of behaviors from sparse and noisy data. In this work we introduce a novel time series dictionary learning algorithm that can robustly learn from weakly labeled data sources.

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Peridomestic ("backyard") chicken flocks are gaining popularity in the developed world (e.g., North America or Europe), yet little is known regarding prevalence or severity of their ectoparasites. Therefore, five birds on each of 20 properties throughout southern California were surveyed in summer for on-host (permanent) and off-host dwelling (temporary) ectoparasites. Only four premises (20%) were entirely free of ectoparasites. In declining order of prevalence (% of premises), permanent ectoparasites included six chicken louse species: Menacanthus stramineus (Nitzsch) (50%), Goniocotes gallinae (De Geer) (35%), Lipeurus caponis (L.) (20%), Menopon gallinae (L.) (15%), Menacanthus cornutus (Schömmer) (5%), and Cuclotogaster heterographus (Nitzsch) (5%). Only one flea species, Echidnophaga gallinacea (Westwood) (20%), was found. Three parasitic mite species were observed: Ornithonyssus sylviarum (Canestrini & Fanzago) (15%), Knemidocoptes mutans (Robin & Lanquetin) (10%), and Dermanyssus gallinae (De Geer) (5%). Many infestations consisted of a few to a dozen individuals per bird, but M. stramineus, G. gallinae, M. cornutus, and E. gallinacea were abundant (dozens to hundreds of individuals) on some birds, and damage by K. mutans was severe on two premises. Off-host dwelling ectoparasites were rare (D. gallinae) or absent (Cimex lectularius L., Argasidae). Parasite diversity in peridomestic flocks greatly exceeds that is routinely observed on commercial chicken flocks and highlights a need for increased biosecurity and development of ectoparasite control options for homeowners.

The northern fowl mite, Ornithonyssus sylviarum, is one of the most common and damaging ectoparasites of poultry. As an obligate blood feeding mite, the northern fowl mite can cause anaemia, slower growth, and decreased egg production of parasitized birds. However, the impact of mites or other ectoparasites on hen behaviour or welfare is not well studied. Here, we use activity sensors (three-axis accelerometers) affixed to individual birds to continuously record hen movement before, during, and after infestation with mites. Movements recorded by sensors were identified to specific bird behaviours through a previously trained algorithm, with frequency of these behaviours recorded for individual birds. Hen welfare was also determined before, during, and after mite infestation of hens using animal-based welfare metrics. Northern fowl mites significantly increased hen preening behaviour and resulted in increased skin lesions of infested birds.

Behavioral resistance of M. domestica to imidacloprid and methomyl persists. Spinosad and cyantraniliprole baits (delayed mortality) performed best. Speed of action may be a factor in use and misuse of baits.

BackgroundNorthern fowl mites (Ornithonyssus sylviarum) are obligate hematophagous ectoparasites of both feral birds and poultry, particularly chicken layers and breeders. They complete their entire life-cycle on infested birds while feeding on blood. Infestations of O. sylviarum are difficult to control and resistance to some chemical classes of acaricides is a growing concern. The contact susceptibility of O. sylviarum to a new active ingredient, fluralaner, was evaluated, as well as other compounds representative of the main chemical classes commonly used to control poultry mite infestations in Europe and the USA.MethodsSix acaricides (fluralaner, spinosad, phoxim, propoxur, permethrin, deltamethrin) were dissolved and serially diluted in butanol:olive oil (1:1) to obtain test solutions used for impregnation of filter paper packets. A carrier-only control was included. Thirty adult northern fowl mites, freshly collected from untreated host chickens, were inserted into each packet for continuous compound exposure. Mite mortality was assessed after incubation of the test packets for 48 h at 75% relative humidity and a temperature of 22 °C.ResultsAdult mite LC50 /LC99 values were 2.95/8.09 ppm for fluralaner, 1587/3123 ppm for spinosad, 420/750 ppm for phoxim and 86/181 ppm for propoxur. Permethrin and deltamethrin LC values could not be calculated due to lack of mortality observed even at 1000 ppm.ConclusionsNorthern fowl mites were highly sensitive to fluralaner after contact exposure. They were moderately sensitive to phoxim and propoxur, and less sensitive to spinosad. Furthermore, the tested mite population appeared to be resistant to the pyrethroids, permethrin and deltamethrin, despite not being exposed to acaricides for at least 10 years.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s13071-017-2289-z) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

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Many flies are considered serious pests of livestock, poultry, and equids. These pests can negatively impact animal welfare and contribute to considerable production losses. Management of filth fly pests in particular, including the house fly (Musca domestica L.), stable fly (Stomoxys calcitrans (L.)), horn fly (Haematobia irritans (L.)), face fly (Musca autumnalis De Geer) (Diptera: Muscidae), and little or lesser house fly (Fannia canicularis (L.) (Diptera: Fanniidae)), has been a research and Extension priority of veterinary entomologists for many decades. However, ongoing changes to animal husbandry and production practices, coupled with an increasing development of behavioral and physiological resistance to insecticides require renewed focus on new and more effective management strategies. This article is the first in a series of updates to these historical reports and the purpose is to serve as a resource for veterinary practitioners, consultants, funding agencies, veterinary entomologists, industry, commodity groups, and the scientific community working towards control of these pests. Companion articles will review individual filth fly species of importance to animal agriculture in the United States