Better Broilers

Americans are eating more chicken today than ever before. Increased chicken choices at fast food restaurants is part of the reason but chicken has always been a popular choice for those looking for a low fat, high protein meal. And as the demand for chicken grows, so does the need to produce more birds for market. When it comes to poultry, these birds are big business! Chicken is the most popular main dish meal in the world. Poultry production in the U.S. has more than doubled in the past 40 years, generating more than 20 billion dollars annually.

The Cobb-Vantress company is one of the world's oldest poultry breeding operations. Their farms here in Fayetteville, Arkansas have been breeding birds since 1961. Hatchery Manager, Scott Jordan explains, "First, the eggs come into the egg holding room and they come in farm racks. That's where we transfer them to incubator racks. And they sit in the incubators for approximately 18 days."

After these eggs hatch, the chicks are separated by sex – the males for breeding and the females for broilers, chickens that end up in the meat department of your supermarket.

John Hardiman, VP of Research and Development for Cobb-Vantress Industries says, "We want a bird that has good feather cover, high yielding birds, birds that are growing fast, birds that walk very well, that walk very easily, animals that have a high degree of fertility and hatchability. So, we need birds to be good breeders and also good broilers."

Changing consumer tastes, foods with less fat and increasing choices in "ready to eat" meals have generated a big jump in chicken consumption. The focus here is selecting and developing traits that answer the demands of poultry producers and consumers.

John says, "This could be efficiency, health of the bird; we try to improve by finding the very best families and the very best individuals each year."

Feed accounts for a large portion of the cost in raising chickens. Advances in feeding methods and new grain options are some of the considerations.

John explains, "In 1980 – it would take about 2.4 pounds of feed for every pound of chicken that we want to grow. But if you look at the efficiency of a bird today, we're looking at birds that consume only about 1.8 pounds of feed per pound."

In addition to consumer concerns about cost and quality...poultry producers here and elsewhere also deal with food safety issues in the health of their birds.

Merrill Bishop, Director of Feed Operations says, "Bio-security is important because we have guaranteed our customers that we are going to provide them with a hundred-percent clean bird, and bio-security is the key to reaching that ultimate goal.

"No one is allowed to enter the hatchery without a shower. We can't enter any kind of clothes from the outside. We have complete wardrobe on the inside – shoes, shirt, pants, everything."

Encounters with production animals require control methods to keep bacteria and pathogens from coming in contact with the birds. And it's a serious business. Anyone who enters must wear protective suits, booties over their shoes, hairnets and gloves. There are also foot pans at each door, and hand sanitizers. So, if you go outside the hatchery, and you come back in, you have to disinfect your shoes and disinfect your hands. Merrill says, "It's a known fact that it is in bi-products that it is in corn. It comes out of fields. Salmonella can come from so many different places. So, we know that it is coming in. We test for it, and we find it."

The testers let their feet do much of the work. Their booties pick up bits and pieces of waste and debris from the hatchery. The gathered material is then analyzed. John explains, "I think through modern technology, I think probably one of the biggest changes is that we can measure the presence of pathogens probably better than we could many, many years ago. The laboratories – both the state laboratories in the poultry states and also the in-house laboratories with Cobb are better equipped to detect pathogens early earlier, faster. And therefore, we can remediate the situation and keep our flocks healthy."

Changes in breeding, along with scientific developments have dramatically increased the amount of poultry produced for sale in the United States and overseas. As producers here like to say: "making a better bird."

Merrill says, "We try to hatch the best, and do the best and be the best. We try to put the customer #1 and try to be the best."