Foot Pad Lesion, Breast Blister dan Performa Produksi Ayam Petelur pada Sistem Perkandangan Litter dan Cage

Abstract

Housing management is one factor that influence the incident of foot pad lesion and breast blister. Foot Pad Lesion (FPL) and Breast Blister (BB) are inflamation of the subcutant tissue on the region foot pad and breast of the chicken caused by intensive rubbing between skin and house floor. This study was designed to evaluate litter and cage system on the incident of FPL, BB, and performance of laying hens. This research used closed housed with temperature range of 18 until 22 oC. A total of 18 hens are reared on bamboo cage and 18 hens on rice husk litter. A number of 9 samples were taken from each housing system to evaluate the score of FPL and BB, egg production, feed intake, and feed conversion ratio. The t-Test was applied to compare the all trait between litter and cage. The result of the experiment showed that the incident level of FPL and BB on hens reared in litter and cage did not significantly different (P>0.05). Increasing incident of FPL in cage was higher than litter (100% vs 33.33%) at fourth week, but overall FPL at both of housing systems increase from first week until fourth week. In addition, egg production, feed consumption, body weight gain and feed conversion ratio were not different.