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The impact of utilizing chopped computer and bond paper as a litter material on growth performance of broilers reared to market age was evaluated. In the first experiment, broilers were placed in pens at 10 birds per square meter, and four different litter treatments were used; 1) 100% chopped computer and bond paper (CCP); 2) a mix of 75% CCP and 25% wood shavings (WS); 3) 50% CCP and 50% WS; 4) 100% WS. Experiment 2 evaluated the same treatments, but with densities of 14 birds per square meter. Litter treatments had no effect on body weight gain, feed consumption, conversion, or mortality for either of the two experiments. No differences were found for percentage litter moisture among treatments. Chopped computer and bond paper alone or mixed in different percentages with WS can be used as an alternate litter material for rearing broilers as long as there is good waterer management, especially with open watering systems. These systems may have the tendency to increase the incidence of litter caking.

Because food and poultry industries are demanding an improvement in written communication skills among graduates, research paper writing should be an integral part of a senior undergraduate class. However, scientific writing assignments are often treated as secondary to developing the technical skills of the students. Scientific research paper writing has been emphasized in an undergraduate course on advanced food microbiology taught in the Poultry Science Department at Texas A& M University (College Station, TX). Students' opinions suggest that research paper writing as part of a senior course in Poultry Science provides students with scientific communication skills and useful training for their career, but more emphasis on reading and understanding scientific literature may be required.

The suitability of recycled paper chips (RPC), formed by completely reprocessing waste newspaper, as litter material for rearing broilers was investigated in two successive trials. In Trial 1, broilers were reared in pens prepared with a 9-cm layer of either unused RPC or pine shavings (PS). In Trial 2, broilers were reared in pens prepared by adding 3 cm of clean RPC or PS to used litter of the same type remaining from Trial 1. Mortality, BW, feed consumption and conversion, carcass yield, and incidences of breast blisters and leg abnormalities were not influenced by litter treatments. Litter moisture was greater in RPC during Week 3 of Trial 1, but did not differ between treatments at other times during either trial. Litter caking was greater in RPC throughout Trial 1, but did not differ between treatments during Trial 2. Populations of aerobic, psychrotrophic, and coliform bacteria, and fungi (yeasts and molds) in the two litter types did not differ during the rearing period of either trial. Populations of aerobic bacteria and fungi were greater in unused PS, and fungi populations were greater in used PS prior to initiation of Trial 2. Populations of psychrotrophic bacteria were greater in used PS 6 days after bird removal in Trial 2. Generally, RPC are comparable to PS and have potential as an alternative litter material for rearing broilers.

CHANG (1955) reported the lowering of the blood hemoglobin of chicks due to free gossypol feeding and postulated that free gossypol in the diet leads to interference with the synthesis of the proteins of the blood in these chicks. In view of the useful information that has been obtained in recent years using the electrophoresis technique in the study of normal and pathological sera, an experiment was planned to study the electrophoretic patterns of serum samples obtained from birds fed a normal diet, as well as from birds fed free gossypol in the diet. An electrophoresis cell using filter paper strips, as originally designed by Durrum (1950) and marketed by Spinco, was employed. Later it was discovered that the resolution of the globulins of chick serum is very poor on filter paper. More serum samples were obtained from birds used in a study of the effect of protein level on …

The suitability of three types of recycled paper products for use as broiler litter was studied in three trials using a total of 9,600 broilers. Litter, consisting of hardwood sawdust (SD) as a control, shredded newspaper (SN), processed newspaper (PN), or processed cardboard (PC), was placed in each of four replicate pens in the first trial and reused in subsequent trials. Body weights at 28 and 49 days were significantly influenced by treatment with broilers reared on SN weighing more than SD controls. Broilers on PC were the lightest. Statistically, the PN broilers were heavier than SD broilers at 28 days but similar to controls by market age. Feed conversion was improved with SN at 28 days but did not differ by 49 days. Mortality was not significantly affected by litter material. The moisture content of paper litters was numerically higher than that of the SD control with significantly greater litter caking occurring in the paper litters. However, only broilers on PC had a greater incidence of breast blisters. Overall and total disease condemnation were not influenced by litter material. Skin color scores were improved with the PN treatment.

PREVIOUS investigations employing the chemical fractionation of serum have presumably isolated immune factors for the avian malaria parasite, Plasmodium lophurae (Becker et al., 1951; Trager and McGhee, 1950; and Truong, 1957). Electorophoretic analysis has also identified serum alterations which appear to be linked to an immune response (Sherman and Hull, 1960). One of the logical adjuncts to the study of the serological changes described by paper electrophoresis is the isolation, purification and characterization of these entities, and correlation of the chemical fractions with the electrophoretic species. Studies of the chemical fractions by means of paper electrophoresis were initiated in the hope of better understanding the relationships between these fractionation procedures. MATERIALS AND METHODS For the chemical fractionation, whole blood was withdrawn from the jugular vein of mature, uninfected Hyline chickens. These samples were incubated at 39°C. in lusteroid centrifuge tubes for one hour to assure maximum clot formation. They were …

Three experiments were conducted to determine the response of bobwhite quail chicks when reared in pens with and without brooding paper. Half the chicks in each experiment was brooded Days 1 to 7 on brooding paper, which covered the litter within a brooder ring. The other half was brooded on either new or reused litter without paper. Results of all three experiments showed a consistent trend of higher 1-week body weights and lower cumulative 1 to 3 week mortality when birds were reared in pens without paper. Overall, no net performance advantages were found for rearing quail with brooding paper at the termination of the 3-week trials.

The U.S.S.R. Branch of the World’s Poultry Science Association met May 29–June 2, 1972, in Alma-Ata, Kazakhstan. A resume of the scientific papers (much more extensive than the usual abstracts) has been published in a 92-page bulletin of attractive format, on good paper, with easily-readable print. One thousand copies of the booklet have been printed. A copy may be obtained from The Moscow Agricultural Academy, Timirasev Street, 44, Moscow 125008, U.S.S.R. The contents reveal the wide scope of the research work carried out in poultry science and the important role of the poultry industry in the agricultural production of the U.S.S.R. A total of 82 papers are presented under the four headings, a) Breeding, b) Nutrition, c) Management Technology and Embryology and d) Physiology and Veterinary Science. The titles of the papers presented at the conference are listed in English, pages 89–93. These titles are: BREEDING Z. M. . . .

DR. ERWIN JUNGHERR of the Storrs Agricultural Experiment Station has chosen wisely to include in his paper on the value of wheat germ oil in the control of fowl paralysis a discussion of recent work on nutritional encephalomalacia, since some of the gross symptoms of this disease are similar to those of fowl paralysis and might be confused with them. He has brought out very clearly that, whereas vitamin E has been found by Dam, Glavind, Bernth, and Hagens, (1938) and by Pappenheimer, Goettsch, and Jungherr (1939) to be effective in preventing the development of nutritional encephalomalacia, a number of investigators have shown that this vitamin is without effect in the prevention of fowl paralysis. He concluded, therefore, that the favorable results obtained by Butler and Warren (1938) and by Butler, Warren, and Hammersland (1938) in the control of fowl paralysis by means of wheat germ oil have not been . . .