ALTERNATIVE SOLUTIONS TO BE USED IN LAYING HENS' HUSBANDRY

Abstract

The strong lobby that animal welfare organizations targeted on the worldwide society imposed some radical changes of the technical concepts, still available within the modern animal husbandry field. Although it is a system used for more than 70% of the laying flocks around the world, one of the most controversial systems is the one of intensive-industrial type, applied in the laying hens’ husbandry. In Romania, the laying hybrids are accommodated, almost exclusively, in conventional cage batteries, triple leveled; the radical replacement of those systems with an improved one could lead to severe disturbances in the technological process, in the flock management or in the economic efficiency of the companies. Considering these criteria, the research team studied the productive response of the hen laying hybrids to one of the alternative husbandry systems accepted in the aviculture practice. Therefore, the evolution of the “Lohmann Brown” hybrid performances were recorded, when the birds were raised in some different modified versions of B.P.-3 cage battery. The economical efficiency of the proposed technical solutions was also quantified.