ABOUT THE IMMUNE SYSTEM IN POULTRY…

In industrial poultry, animals are susceptible to many diseases due to the fact that the rearing period is carried out in environmentally controlled poultry houses. This is one of the biggest problems of modern businesses. Despite the strict hygiene protocols applied to ensure biosecurity, house conditions can be challenging. Factors such as dirty bedding and bad weather conditions are among the most immunosuppressive factors.
The poultry industry implements a vigorous vaccination program to protect isolated and under-immune animals. With vaccination, it is aimed to develop immunity against certain pathogens in the poultry house. However, the application of the vaccine alone is not enough to achieve this goal.
Immunity in poultry; It is a complex system of lymphocytes, T and B cells, macrophages, NK cells, Immunoglobulins and cytokines. This system is simply tasked with identifying, recognizing and destroying the pathogen. The importance of vaccines in identifying and recognizing the pathogen cannot be discussed. However, the animal's immune system must already be working properly in order for the vaccine to produce a desired immune response. In other words, while the vaccine provides the genetic information necessary to create antibodies, it is the animal's own immune system that will produce the antibody and fight the pathogen when encountered.

Importance of Nutrition

Another dilemma of industrial poultry in terms of immune system is feed. Animals are fed in a way that gives the most energy and is the least costly, in order to obtain high efficiency. Although feed companies offer products with mixtures for chickens raised for different purposes (broiler, layer, breeder) or for different periods (chick, adult), uniform feeding and the harms of this diet are observed in the long term.
In their natural environment, it is inevitable that chickens, which are fed extremely rich in plant sources such as various seeds and leaves, and animal sources such as insects and earthworms, have problems with uniform feeding in industrial poultry houses.
Kümesleri hastalık tehdidinden korumanın önemli bir aşaması beslenmedir. Gerek aşı uygulamalarından maksimum sonuç elde etmek gerekse hastalık durumunda en kısa sürede tedavi sağlamak... Amaç ne olursa olsun bağışıklık sisteminin doğru bir beslenme planı ile desteklenmesi şarttır.

An important stage of protecting the poultry house from the threat of disease is feeding. Both to obtain maximum results from vaccination applications and to provide treatment as soon as possible in case of illness... Regardless of the purpose, it is essential to support the immune system with a correct nutrition plan.

Sources

1. Kanatlılarda Bağışıklık Sistemi ve Bağışıklık Sistemini Etkileyen Besinsel Faktörler, Şenay Sarıca, Ümit Karataş, Raziye Gözalan
2. Tavuklarda Bağışıklık sistemi ve Tavuk Yetişitiriciliğinde İmmun Sistemi Desteklemek için Yapılan Uygulamalar, E.Eren Gültepe, İ.Sadi Çetingül, A Amir Iqbal, Cangir Uyarlar, İsmail Bayram
3. Kanatlilarda Bağışıklık Sistemi ve Bağışıklığın Baskılanması, Veteriner Tavukçuluk Derneği , ANKARA 1998 Editör: Prof. Dr. İ. Ayhan Özkul