Flemish NPG starts up an additional project

– by Laura Van Vooren (BioForum)

Search for worms in the guts sampled from laying hens during autopsy – © BioForum

Bioforum facilitates two PPILOW National Practitioner Groups, one on layers and one on pigs. Both NPGs focus on organic production. The layer NPG, consisting of laying hen farmers, veterinarians, feed producers, breeders and retailers, expressed the need to work together on the topic of natural feed additives to promote health and robustness in layers and more specifically to suppress worm infections. During a NPG meeting in 2020, scientists were invited to discuss this topic and a first idea for a research project was launched. Last months, several NPG members, Bioforum and ILVO started a two-year project to investigate the role of several plant-based products. In this project, two plant-based products will be supplied to organic layers and worm infection pressure will be monitored by means of egg counts, autopsies and blood samples. Progress and results of this project are shared on regular basis with the NPG.