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Title: FEATHER RETENTION FORCE IN BROILERS ANTE-, PERI-, AND POST-MORTEM AS INFLUENCED BY CARCASS ORIENTATION, ANGLE OF EXTRACTION, AND SLAUGHTER METHOD

Author
item BUHR, R. - UGA
item Cason Jr, John
item ROWLAND, G. - UGA

Submitted to: Poultry Science
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 6/1/1997
Publication Date: N/A
Citation: N/A

Interpretive Summary: Broiler stunning & slaughter experiments were conducted to clarify environmental & neurobiological variables that could potentially lower feather retention force (FRF) & enable easier feather picking. The pectoral, sternal & femoral feather tracts differed in FRF. All treatments minimally effected FRF before death & had no effect after death. The presence or absence of an intact spinal cord did not influence FRF. Feathers extracted perpendicular to the skin surface consistently required 9 to 29% less force than feathers extracted parallel to the skin.

Technical Abstract: Stunning & slaughter trials were conducted to evaluate the influence of carcass orientation (inverted or supine), angle of feather extraction (parallel or perpendicular to the carcass surface), & slaughter method (exsanguination with or without spinal cord transection) on feather retention force (FRF) in commercial broilers sampled ante-, peri-, & post-mortem. The pectoral, sternal, & femoral feather tracts were sampled before & after stunning contralaterally, with a maximum indicating force gauge, from broilers suspended on a shackle (inverted) or laying on a table (supine). Feathers extracted parallel to the carcass resulted in consistently greater FRF (9 to 29%) than feathers extracted at a perpendicular angle, at all sample periods. Broilers suspended on shackles ante- & peri-mortem had higher FRF values (+5 to +30%) than those restrained in shackles supine on a table. Electrical stunning, when not followed by bleeding, resulted in small reductions in FRF (up to 7%). Bleeding after stunning without or with spinal cord transection resulted in variable peri-mortem FRF changes (+7 to -11% & +11 to -11%, respectively). For only the pectoral feather tract was there a significant increase (5 to 6%) in FRF from ante- to peri-mortem. At two & six min after stunning & initiation of exsanguination, post-mortem femoral tracts.