Abstract
The present study was conducted to determine the effect of different cooling systems; Fan Fogger (FF) and Fan Pad (FP) on micro environment of poultry house, thermal comfort, welfare, egg production and egg quality parameters of laying hens. This experiment was conducted on 210, White Leghorn laying pullets (32 weeks old) during hot-dry summer months (May - July) under deep litter system of housing. The FP and FF cooling systems significantly dropped the mean shed temperature and increased the relative humidity. Thus, better THI resulted in increase in egg production by 4.66 % and 3.32 % under FP and FF systems over the control group. However, specific gravity, H.U, egg shell thickness, yolk index and yolk color were not significantly influenced by cooling treatments. Significantly lower levels of antioxidant enzymes viz. LPO, Catalase, G6PD, GPx and SOD was registered in cooling groups. Both the cooling devices contributed towards bird welfare by altering the behavioral expression from agonistic to non-agonistic activities.
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