THE RELATION OF INTESTINAL WORMS TO POULTRY 



HYGIENE 



BY GEORGE EDWARD GAGE 



Poultry hygiene today embodies all those factors which are conducive 

 to the maintenance of poultry in a healthy, vigorous condition. To the 

 average layman this simply means attending to the general outward appear- 

 ance of the different housing and yarding conditions, as to neatness and 

 general cleanliness. The term, however, has a far broader meaning when 

 applied in the purely scientific sense. It means, among other things, are 

 intestinal worms and other parasites present on the poultry premises? 

 Are they a constant menace to the general well being of the birds which are 

 to furnish produce for the market? The statement that some of the birds 

 are harboring intestinal worms may sound simple, but, if it is true, great 

 may be the consequences from the standpoint of breeding and finance. 



. The question of worms is of far greater importance than the poultry 

 investigator is apt to believe. In the southern states these parasites are 

 undoubtedly responsible for more disease than simply those ailments which 

 are designated as tseniade infestations. The relation of these intestinal 

 parasites to the fundamental principles of poultry hygiene is paramount. 

 Their powers of depleting nourishment supply, of injuring the intestinal 

 epithelium and of invoking a nervous condition are only a few instances of 

 their work in starting the course for other infectious diseases in which they 

 prepare the path for either pathogenic bacteria or other deadly parasites 

 which, by their bacterial action or poisons, may ultimately cause the death 

 of the fowl. 



It has been my experience in Maryland to observe the autopsy of many 

 birds in which the intestinal mucosa was greatly damaged either by the 

 presence of tapeworms or round worms. They caused an intestinal catarrh 

 which formed denuded areas infested with animal parasites and thus caused 

 the death of the birds. 



In reviewing literature on the various parasitic diseases, it is interesting 

 to note the importance which many pathologists attach to worm infesta- 

 tion. It may be a complication in fowl cholera, blackhead in turkeys, 

 and in several others of the intestinal diseases of domestic birds. When the 

 intestinal tract is invaded by Tsenia inf undibuliformis, a tapeworm common 

 in Maryland, Virginia and West Virginia, or by round worms of the Hetera- 

 kis type, common in Maryland, undoubtedly they play a great part in 

 hastening a fatal issue in any bird suffering from any other intestinal 



