Welcome to our Autumn newsletter. The weather is now moving well into preparing us for the winter and all that brings. As a vet my mind is obviously occupied with what the winter avian influenza “season” might have in store for us. None of you need reminding how devastating the outbreaks last winter were for everyone involved in the poultry industry. The situation at the moment seems to be ominously quiet in terms of widespread outbreaks in commercial poultry and even wild bird detections, and that might give us some reason for cautious optimism. BUT (and it’s clearly a big but) we cannot be complacent. Biosecurity holds the key as we heard in the excellent Gordon Memorial Lecture delivered by Prof Ian Brown at our Spring Meeting in Birmingham. Taken to its simplest terms it involves preventing what is outside from getting inside and we all have a role in supporting that. Much discussion continues on vaccination as this is the industry’s usual approach to controlling poultry diseases. It is obviously not the complete or easy answer for avian influenza but everyone is looking at progress and discussions as to what the future might look like.

In the meantime, looking at the future of WPSA UK Branch I would highlight two aspects for you to think about. Firstly, your Association depends on YOU! We depend heavily on our hard-working Council to run the nuts and bolts of our business taking us forward to being the “go to” destination for promoting “the advancement of scientific knowledge and public education and training in the agricultural use of the avian species” – not my words, but taken verbatim from the objectives of WPSA UK Branch stated in our Constitution! This means having a critical mass of interested and involved members of the Branch. So please do all you can to spread the word and encourage people you work with to join WPSA (see our website on how easy it is for new members to join!) be they from academia, research, industry advisors and those involved in primary poultry production. There is something for everyone in WPSA. That leads nicely to my second aspect, and that is our annual Spring Meeting – your programme committee has already put together the framework for our next meeting in Belfast (9-11 April 2024, Assembly Building conference centre, Belfast). This meeting is our focal point of the year allowing us to meet and exchange ideas and up to date research and knowledge sharing. Please see elsewhere in this newsletter of how to register for the meeting and also details on the annual Gordon Memorial Lecture which will be delivered at the Spring Meeting.

I hope you find all the information you need in this newsletter, kindly put together by Vicky Sandilands, our new Secretary. Vicky would be very happy to receive articles, information or other contributions for future newsletters so that this, together with our excellent website, gives you all you need to know about YOUR Association. If you cannot find what you need or have any other comments or suggestions on Branch activities then do not hesitate to contact Vicky or myself and we will be happy to listen! Reach us via our contact form here.

I hope you have an enjoyable and successful rest of 2023 and look forward to meeting up in the new year!

• Stephen Lister, UK Branch President

Our next UK-branch conference, the WPSA-UK Spring Meeting, will be held in Belfast 9-11 April 2024. Details are found here – WPSA UK Branch Meeting 2024 – WPSA (wpsa-uk.com). The meeting venue is the Assembly Buildings Conference Centre, just a few minutes’ walk from the city Centre train station. Our partner organisation, BSAS has secured discount codes with some of the local hotels, so please see the Spring Meeting page for details. As well as an exciting programme that includes guest industry speakers and a joint session with BSAS, we will be hosting the Gordon Memorial Trust’s invited lecture by Professor Ian Dunn on ‘Genotype, phenotype, selection and more: improving the skeletal health of laying hens’.

Abstract submission is OPEN until 20th November 2023. All details, including the abstract guidance that you must follow, are found here Submissions – WPSA (wpsa-uk.com).

Did you know that, if you are a student or retired member, you could be eligible for a travel grant to support your attendance at the spring meeting? For students, you increase your chance of gaining a travel award if you submit an abstract for the meeting. Deadline for applications is 5th February 2024.

Read what a former Travel Grant recipient had to say about this:

I am very grateful to be a recipient of the WPSA UK Student Travel Grant, which allowed me to attend and present at the Spring Meeting. Receiving the grant helped cover expenses related to attending the meeting that would otherwise come out of my PhD research funding. Having those costs covered was a relief and allows me greater opportunity to attend and present at future WPSA meetings as well as other conferences. Being able to attend the meeting in person was very beneficial. It gave me the opportunity to meet students, researchers, and industry representatives from around the UK and hear more about their research. Having the opportunity to present in person allowed me to gain more experience with giving scientific presentations and being able to present to an audience who wasn’t familiar with my research allowed for interesting questions to be asked and discussed further. The application process was very simple, and I encourage all students to apply!

For more details, visit the WPSA UK Travel Grant application – WPSA (wpsa-uk.com)

Meanwhile, please register for the conference at: WPSA Registration Site – GDPR Compliance (eventsair.com)

We realise that November is not really the time to think about summer, but if you are a student, or a supervisor who will have a student working with them for a dissertation project or similar, then you may want to consider how the branch can offer financial support. Applications are due at the end of March 2024 Summer Vacation Scholarships – WPSA (wpsa-uk.com).

One of our former awardees, Yuhui Yang from University of Edinburgh, explains how she benefitted from a summer vacation scholarship:

My interest in poultry science began when I helped my family with chicken husbandry when I was young. After learning about cell biology and pathology at university, I realized the importance of topics such as embryonic development and wound healing to animal health. Thus, I was inspired to do a laboratory-based research project related to these. This WPSA scholarship was recommended by colleagues at the Royal (Dick) Vet School, where I am studying. I met and had a discussion with my supervisor, Dr Joe Rainger, about a prospective project and then decided to apply.

This scholarship greatly supported my living costs and the lab consumables throughout the research period. It enabled me to work comfortably, to appreciate the realities of performing research work, and to conduct this knowing that small incremental findings contribute towards a broader outcome over the long term.

From my experiments, I found that heterotypic N-/E-cadherin cell junctions are unfavourable in growing epithelia. This result provides a basis for further work in chicken embryos and cell culture systems to determine the consequence of this to cell-cell adhesion, cell migration, and tissue fusion during embryonic development, and the broader life-long health of poultry

Yuhui Yang

UK poultry researchers are investigating a vast array of areas that can have real impact on birds. Here is just a glance at some work going on. Do you have research news you would like to share? Let us know!

Poultry at Slaughter

A new research project has been funded by a response mode BBSRC grant and co-funded by Defra under the Government Partnership Awards (GPA) scheme exploring “Breathless birds: does air hunger impact the welfare of poultry at slaughter?”

The project is being led by Dr Jessica Martin (Newcastle University, UK) in collaboration with Dr Dorothy McKeegan (University of Glasgow, UK), Dr Siobhan Abeyesinghe (Royal Veterinary College, UK), Prof Simone Meddle (University of Edinburgh, UK), Prof Ngaio Beausoleil (Massey University, NZ) and Julian Sparrey (Livetec Systems Ltd., UK).

Globally, 72.4 billion chickens are slaughtered each year for food production. In 2021 in the UK, 1.15 billion broiler chickens (reared for meat) were slaughtered across 50 operating slaughterhouses and 57 million end-of-lay hens (reared for egg-laying) were killed at the end of their production cycle. Poultry production represents the largest number of individual animals killed by humans for food production (excluding fish) by a large margin. As a result, the methods used to stun and slaughter poultry are critically important to ensure animal welfare standards for the most numerous terrestrial production animal.

There are two main methods of stunning chickens: electrical stunning and controlled atmosphere stunning (CAS). CAS is the primary method for poultry in the UK (~70%) and it is increasingly in use in the EU (~40%). CAS involves exposing chickens to gas mixtures, leading to unconsciousness and eventual death. CAS was originally developed to combat welfare harms associated with electrical stunning (e.g., live handling) and as such has some welfare advantages compared to electrical stunning. Commercial CAS systems most commonly expose conscious birds to increasing concentrations of carbon dioxide (CO2). CO2 has anaesthetising properties; however above certain concentrations exposure can cause pain (e.g., burning in the nose). During CAS, although painful levels of CO2 are avoided while the chickens may be conscious, these gases cause a deep breathing (hyperventilation) response, expressed by obvious changes in behaviour (e.g., gasping). It is unknown whether these behavioural changes correspond to sensations reported in humans such as breathlessness and ‘air hunger’ when inhaling CO2. Air hunger is reported by humans as a deeply unpleasant experience, consisting of an uncomfortable urge to breathe which is associated with profound anxiety, frustration and fear. We do not know if birds experience these sensations and the consequences, they have on animal welfare. If the gas mixtures used in CAS cause air hunger in chickens, this constitutes a very significant welfare issue, calling into question whether CAS is a humane method of pre-slaughter stunning. Given birds are capable of flight at high altitudes, and have a unique respiratory system compared to mammals, the susceptibility of birds to air hunger is difficult to predict, and no previous studies have specifically examined the emotional responses of birds to these sensations. Although some earlier studies have demonstrated that chickens avoid CO2, research has never addressed why, and more importantly if, air hunger plays a part in this avoidance. Simple behavioural tests, such as allowing birds to leave a space containing CO2, are flawed since CO2 is an anaesthetic that is likely to slow or impair the bird’s responses. Therefore, more sophisticated behavioural approaches such as those allowing birds to demonstrate if they remember negative emotions associated with exposure to CO2, and if so, whether these emotions are reflected by birds choosing not to re-enter environments where this occurred.

Tackling the question of whether air hunger is experienced by billions of chickens undergoing CAS is extremely important. The work we propose is novel and answers a fundamental question, which will enable the development of a novel methodology to detect air hunger in birds. If our studies show that air hunger is not an issue relevant to poultry slaughter, CAS will be proven to be a high welfare method and its uptake will be enhanced globally. If air hunger is apparent, the results will drive the development of more humane stunning approaches, ensuring that the current transition away from electrical stunning systems represents genuine welfare improvement. Whatever the findings, the work will provide valuable information to inform future policy globally. For more information, contact: jessica.martin@newcastle.ac.uk

Climate change and the poultry industry

Climate change is impacting every aspect of UK farming and the food production supply chain. The poultry sector is generally associated with a relatively low carbon footprint compared with dairy, beef, and sheep sectors.

The main contributors to the carbon footprint of both poultry egg and meat production are feed (efficiency and ingredients), processing and transport. Improvements in animal health, welfare, and waste management also all come into play. All these issues are being actively examined by the UK research fraternity involving academics, industry and other bodies often involving collaboration between industry and academia. Our Net Zero target balanced with the need to ensure food security and maintain a profitable industry has focused research and increased the need for collaboration.

Studies to improve feed conversion efficiency aided by feed additives and the use of alternative feed ingredients such as insect, seaweeds/algae and other alternative proteins are routine across research institutions. The development and increased use of slower growing breeds has resulted in further work to optimise the breeds used and feeding programmes. Welfare and behaviour studies continue to look at rearing systems birds for meat and egg production in a way that meets birds’ welfare and behaviour requirements with the added complication of bird flu and housing orders. The carbon footprint of poultry can be significantly reduced with the improvement in bird health and longevity and important studies continue in genetics, disease prevention and treatments. Poultry production typically results in significant emissions and a vital work reducing these emissions such as changes to feed formulations and litter treatment is ongoing.

Research in the UK is varied and of high quality; the combined research strength will provide is with the best chance to move closer to Net Zero and whilst maintaining a profitable industry. For more information, contact: fiona.short@cielivestock.co.uk

I trust this message finds you all in good health and high spirits. As we approach the end of 2023, it’s time to make preparations for the upcoming year. With this in mind, I would like to remind you that your WPSA-UK branch membership will require renewal on 2nd January 2024. For those of you who have already opted for the convenience of direct debit as their payment method, there is no need for concern. However, for those of you who use different payment methods, I kindly ask that you set a reminder to ensure your timely renewal. If some of you are planning to combine your annual subscription payment with your spring meeting registration, please let me know in advance to avoid receiving a renewal reminder in January.

• Farina Khattak, UK Branch Treasurer & Membership Secretary

Did you know that WPSA-UK branch has a presence in the following places? Find us there!

• Linkedin
• Facebook – coming soon!
• Twitter/X
• Instagram

A retired member of the WPSA-UK community is offering his entire collection of printed World’s Poultry Science Journals to a good home, from 2008 to date. They are only available for collection from the spring meeting conference venue in Belfast, so please contact the secretary if you would like to have them: she will put you in touch with the donor.

At the Annual General Meeting (AGM), which will be held in April 2024 at our Belfast meeting, we anticipate having four council positions open. Would you like to join council and help how your local branch is run? The duties are light (two meetings a year, one of which is typically online, and some email business) plus we are a friendly bunch 😊. We welcome members from industry and academia alike. You must be a WPSA-UK branch member to join council. If you would like more information, please email Vicky via this contact form.