Three. Key Detail Management and Standardized Operating Recommendations
1, precise weight control: start by building a foundation in body fat
Standard range: Before the start of production, the hens’ body weight should be controlled within ±10% of the standard value for this breed. Excessive weight not only increases the risk of fatty liver syndrome, but also suppresses estrogen secretion and shortens the duration of peak egg production.
Body fat deposition window: 16–22 weeks of age is a critical period for building a foundation of body fat. Adjust dietary energy, protein, crude fiber, and fat levels to meet fat storage needs while avoiding excessive deposition.
Operating recommendation: Strictly implement weighing by pen, dynamically adjusting feed amounts by partition to ensure the flock meets the uniformity target (≥80 percent), laying the foundation for light stimulation and a smooth start to production.
2, scientific light stimulation: balancing timing and intensity
Prerequisites for adding light: target weight met (±10%), uniformity ≥80%, and assessment of breast shape, interpubic distance, and fat deposition completed.
Negative impact control: Excessively strong lighting can trigger feather pecking and vent pecking, and worsen the asynchronous sexual and physical maturity of underweight chickens, resulting in a prolonged period of small-egg production and a shorter peak production period.
Strategy adjustment: Determine when to increase lighting strictly according to the flock’s physiological condition. Avoid blindly advancing or intensifying lighting to pursue a higher egg production rate, thereby reducing stress-induced immunosuppression.
3, orderly feed increase during the egg-laying ramp-up period
Feeding rate: from 23 to 30 weeks of age, increase the feed amount from 100 grams to 160 grams, with an average weekly increase of 8–10 grams, in step with the rise in egg production rate.
Individual differences: Approximately 30% of the flock are low-producing hens. At the same feed intake, they are more prone to excess energy intake and obesity. Therefore, the feeding program should be dynamically adjusted based on laying rate, double-yolk egg proportion, daily weight gain, and prolapse incidence, avoiding a one-size-fits-all approach.
4, Scientific Supplementation Strategies During the Egg-Laying Pause
In actual production, when the laying rate stagnates, managers often stop increasing feed, but at this point hens still need energy for body weight gain, egg weight gain, and maintaining body temperature.
Energy requirement principle: The feed quantity should be calculated according to the formula for the hens’ total energy requirements to ensure that nutritional needs beyond egg production are met. Otherwise, once the stress factor is removed, the reproductive system may not recover in time.
Case evidence: A certain flock’s laying rate at 26–28 weeks of age was below the standard by 20%. After feed was supplemented according to energy requirements, the laying rate quickly recovered to the standard level by 29 weeks of age, ultimately achieving the target number of qualifying hatching eggs per hen housed.
On-site improvements for 5, material grabbing, choking on material, and external injuries
Feeding program optimization: After the lights come on, provide water for 1 hours, then turn off the lights and dispense feed. Feed the birds when the lights come on again. This procedure can alleviate fasting stress in the flock and significantly reduce competition for feed and the incidence of choking on feed.
Partition retention strategy: Remove the partitions in the rearing period after the peak feeding period to effectively limit large-scale running and trampling among the flock.
Injury prevention and control: Group birds early, selecting hens and roosters of similar weight and age in weeks. Add roosters at night to reduce fighting, and strictly limit the introduction of roosters during the peak laying period. At the same time, increase inspections and promptly isolate and treat hens with injuries or prolapse to prevent secondary infections.
6, refined material-level management after production begins
After production begins, as the amount of feed increases, feed-level management is often overlooked on site. This is particularly true when partitions are present, where differences in mortality and culling rates among pens are often ignored.
Precision feed reduction principle: Record the number of culled and dead birds by partition, then use this to calculate the feed level and quantity for the actual number of chickens remaining in stock, achieving “feed reduction by bird” and avoiding loss of control over the body weight of flocks in some poultry houses due to uneven feed reduction.
Four. Conclusion
Controlling mortality and culling rates during peak egg production is fundamentally a matter of systematically managing operational details. Precise body weight management, scientifically designed lighting programs, dynamic feed allocation strategies, and standardized on-site procedures can effectively reduce the incidence of key contributing factors such as liver rupture, prolapse, and feed aspiration, significantly improving flock health and production performance.
The operational details mentioned in this section are usually emphasized in the breeder management manual, but are often overlooked or not properly implemented in practice. Frequent turnover among frontline employees is also one reason why detailed management procedures are not properly carried out. These details should be discussed every day, checked continuously, and reviewed every month until they become good operating habits.
Attention to detail is a key tool for risk prevention and control: focusing on details helps identify potential risk points early and take preventive measures in a timely manner, resolving issues before they take root and thereby avoiding a small problem turning into a major loss. Poultry enterprises in China should prioritize data accumulation and the implementation of good operating practices, applying the principles of refined management throughout the entire production cycle of breeder chickens, ultimately achieving breakthroughs in both the number of eggs produced per hen housed and chick quality.