The effects of walking with or without obstacles on broiler and duck growth and leg health

1. Leg health is a persistent welfare concern in commercial poultry production. This study investigated whether increasing walking distance, alone or in combination with physical obstacles, could improve growth and leg health in broiler chickens and Pekin ducks.2. The experiment comprised four treatments applied from hatch to market weight: a short control pen (2 m long) with feed and water in close proximity (CON); a long pen (6 m long) with feed and water at opposite ends (WALK); a long pen with a step-over obstacle at the midpoint (OBS); and a long pen with a ramp at the midpoint (RAMP). Broiler chickens were reared to d 42 and Pekin ducks to d 35.3. Feed intake (FI), bird weight, feed conversion ratio (FCR), mortality, gait score and tibia ash and breaking strength were measured in both species.4. No differences (p > 0.05) were observed between treatments in mortality or tibia ash in either broilers or ducks. In broilers, CON birds consumed less feed (91.5 g/bird/d), weighed less at d 42 (2.50 kg), had higher gait scores (2.5) and lower tibia breaking strength (37.1 g) than all locomotion treatments (p < 0.05). No differences were found among the WALK, OBS or RAMP treatments (p > 0.05).5. In ducks, CON birds consumed more feed (125.5 g/bird/d), weighed less at d 35 (2.98 kg), had a higher FCR (1.80) and lower tibia breaking strength (27.0 g) than all locomotion treatments (p < 0.05). No differences were observed among the three locomotion treatments (p > 0.05).