Effect of photoperiod length and light intensity on some welfare criteria, carcass, and meat quality characteristics in broilers

Abstract

-The objective of this study was to investigate the effects of photoperiod length and light intensity on leg and eye health, tonic immobility, some blood parameters, carcass, and meat quality characteristics in broilers. A total of 272 one-day-old male broiler chicks (Ross 308) were randomly assigned to four treatment groups based on the photoperiod length (23L:1D or increasing duration of light) and light intensity (20 lux vs. dim light) with four replicates. In this study, photoperiod lenght had no effect on incidence of foot pad and hock burn. On the other hand, the effect of photoperiod lenght had significant influence on the gait score. The incidences of gait score (3 + 4 + 5) in bright and dim light groups was found as 21.4 and 41.0% in broilers, respectively. In addition, the effect of light intensity had statistical significance on gait score. The tonic immobility duration in 20 lux and dim light groups were 271.53 and 226.78 s, respectively, and tonic immobility duration was unaffected by light intensity. All the blood parameters, except for triglyceride, were not affected by light intensity. The dim light had a negative effect on broiler welfare as demonstrated by increased eye weight and dimensions. Cold carcass yield and whole breast and wing yields were lower in the dim light group than in 20 lux light intensity. The broilers kept with dim light had lower breast meat ultimate pH (6.19) and L* values (54.30) than those reared with 20 lux. These findings have a lot of implications on the use of increasing photoperiod and bright light to improve leg an eye health benefits for the broiler welfare in broilers.

Effects of Photoperiod Regime on Meat Quality, Oxidative Stability, and Metabolites of Postmortem Broiler Fillet (M. Pectoralis major) Muscles

“…In addition, aside from a trend of higher freezing/thawing loss in 16L:8D (p = 0.098), there was no other impact of photoperiod on WHC. Similarly, other studies have found no impact of photoperiod on WHC [17,36]. No differences in shear force values were also observed across treatments, and, to our knowledge, studies measuring instrumental tenderness of broiler fillet muscles associated with photoperiod effects are unavailable in the current literature.…”

Effect of Intermittent Lighting on the Carcass Characteristics, Internal Organs, Relative Weight and Ph Value of the Digestive System, and Some of the Immunological Traits of Broiler Chicken

“…It is noticed from Table 2 that there was no significant effect for all lighting systems in the sixth and seventh weeks of age in the dressing yield without and with edible organs. These results agreed with each of the researchers (Fidan et al, 2017a andOlanrewaju et al, 2018) who noted no significant differences in the dressing yield when using different lighting systems. The same table also indicates that there were no significant differences in the relative weights of carcass parts at the sixth week of age, and it was in agreement with the results of Adabi et al (2007) and Coban et al (2014).…”

Effects of Light Intensity on Growth, Anti-Stress Ability and Immune Function in Yellow Feathered Broilers

“…Light intensity plays an important role in broiler's health (Blatchford et al, 2012). Studies showed that low light intensity has negative effects on broiler's carcass traits, early uniformity and meat tenderness, and is in relation to incidence of leg disease, eye defects, dystrophy, skeletal disorders, as well as foot pad health (Blatchford et al, 2009;Deep et al, 2012;Senaratna et al, 2016;Fidan et al, 2017;Rault et al, 2017). High light intensity can improve activity (Blatchford et al, 2012;Rault et al, 2017) and benefit bone health (Blatchford et al, 2009), increase growth and breast muscle percentage (Deep et al, 2013), and give comfort behaviors for broilers (Alvino et al, 2009).…”