A preliminary study: an innovative approach for an early detection of health problems in poultry

Monitoring the health status of broilers and laying hens takes a key role for farming management in the reduction of chemicals/drugs and their costs. Nowadays, the preventive use of antibiotics is common in the intensive farming system; therefore, this management practice could result in the antibiotic resistance. For this reason, different professional figures are focused on detection of drugs reduction strategies. Due to the high priority of the above-mentioned issue, it is of primary importance the early detection of any health problem in intensive farming. Precision livestock farming (PLF), through the combination of cheap technologies and specific algorithms, can provide valuable information for farmers starting from the huge amount of data collected in real time at farm level. A system based on sensors was developed and tested to recognise health problems at an early-stage. The innovative approach of this methodology is the capability to provide reliable real-time information and repeatable responses. The output of this tool is an odour fingerprint that allows the identification and discrimination of specific chemical odour properties of sampled air, to have a prompt evaluation of the health status in the poultry house.