Abstract |
Because poultry manure is an agricultural waste, methods of disposing and treating it must be found. The interrelationships between poultry manure processing, bacterial load, pathogenicity, and bird performance are poorly understood. In an attempt to deal with these problems, six experiments were conducted to compare the effects of various litter treatments on bird performance to eight weeks of age. To produce litter for broiler-type male chickens, the experimenters mixed poultry manure with other substances such as pine shavings, fresh sand, and cleaned rice hulls. Some of the mixtures were treated with a bacterial preparation. Comparisons were made of the treatments to see if the poultry manure could be incorporated into a mixture that would be beneficial to the chickens. The survival of disease agents in composted poultry waste was also investigated. Observations were recorded for each experiment. |