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Ep 35 | Dave Hodson Jr, Rose Hill Poultry: Managing laying hens for optimal health and performance
136 Plays21 days ago
Poultry Network’s latest podcast hears from Rose Hill’s Dave Hodson Jr, who argues that strong layer performance starts with getting the basics right – and that vaccination only delivers if it is applied properly.
Speaking on a technical episode focused on the laying sector, Mr Hodson drew on decades of experience working with commercial flocks and said producers should think less about vaccination as a routine task and more about whether every bird is genuinely receiving a live, effective dose.
He said that in free-range egg production especially, disease pressure can build quickly if detail is missed. While older cage systems were designed to reduce challenges such as worms and coccidiosis, modern free-range systems have reintroduced many of those risks, alongside greater contact with wild birds and more variable range conditions.
That makes good vaccination programmes important, but also means they cannot be looked at in isolation. Mr Hodson said flock health depends on controlling several areas at once, including respiratory disease, parasite burden, water quality and the condition of the range.
A key point from the discussion was that vaccine handling and administration matter just as much as the product itself. Once a live vaccine is mixed, it begins to lose viability, meaning storage, mixing and delivery through the water system all need careful attention. He also highlighted tongue staining as a practical way of checking whether birds have actually taken in the vaccine, alongside serology and close monitoring of flock performance.
Infectious bronchitis was one of the main examples discussed, with Mr Hodson warning that vaccination intervals still need to be right even when administration is good. Push protection too far, he suggested, and flocks can still be left vulnerable.
The conversation also widened into the broader management picture on free-range units. Red mite, poor water quality, worm burden and weak range management were all identified as common factors that can undermine performance, regardless of how well a vaccination programme looks on paper.
Throughout the episode, the emphasis was on stockmanship. Mr Hodson argued that the best producers are those who know what normal looks like in their birds, spot changes early and deal with problems before they become expensive.
For UK egg producers, the message was not about chasing one silver bullet. It was about building consistency – one flock after another – through better vaccination, better observation and tighter control of the everyday factors that shape hen health and output.
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Transcript
Introduction and Podcast Overview
00:00:16
Speaker
Welcome back to another episode of the Poultry Network podcast. My name is Tom Willings. And I am Tom Woolman. Mr. Warman, nice to see you. How are you keeping? I'm all right. I sounded like I was reading my name off of ah off of a sheet there, didn't I? A bit like I didn't actually know what my name was. But rest assured, i I do know what my name is. It's got to be six months in. My my skills at introduction don't get any better.
00:00:39
Speaker
and I feel very yeah yeah out of my depth every time we we press the record button. um We've got a bit of a different episode lined up this week. We've got a a technical session.
00:00:53
Speaker
Tech Sesh. Tech Sesh. And this is this is layer focused. So to our to our friends in the meat industry, um yeah forgive us for focusing on on layers, but our guest this week is is very much a um ah a layer expert, layer a guru. And and hopefully and the audience of producers will take a bit of value from our interview.
00:01:18
Speaker
Yeah. OK. All right. Shall we welcome him in? Let's get into the interview, yeah.
Exploring the Poultry Network
00:01:29
Speaker
The Poultry Network podcast is brought to you by Poultry Network, the yeah UK's digital resource for the poultry sector. Alongside the podcast, we of course have our website and our new look newsletter, delivering a weekly digest of news, market insight, technical features and industry analysis straight to your inbox, whatever part of the poultry sector you work in, whether you're a producer, an integrator, egg packer or a business within the supply chain across the UK.
00:01:56
Speaker
If you're involved in Poultry, it's completely free to read and subscribe. Visit poultry.network in your browser and input your email. Once you have, make sure we are added to your contacts or safe sender list to ensure you never miss an episode.
00:02:13
Speaker
And if you're a business supplying products or services to the sector, why not advertise where your customers already are? To discuss podcast sponsorship, newsletter placements or digital campaigns, email jake at dmediagroup.com.
00:02:28
Speaker
Poultry Network. Unrivaled insights into commercial poultry production.
Dave Hodson Jr.'s Background in Poultry
00:02:37
Speaker
We're joined by Dave Hodson Jr. from from Rose Hill, the the self-proclaimed vaccination ah guru. 55 years in business, Dave. and Rose Hill have got a hell of a track record.
00:02:50
Speaker
ah Yes, yes. I mean, I've got a really good skincare regime, so that helps. But it's it's a family business, but we've been very lucky. and The generation above me started working at the very inception of live vaccines being used in the UK.
00:03:04
Speaker
And he admits himself and nobody knew what they were doing. And because our customers needed them, we had to learn what to do. And now we look after, with St. David's, about 12 million laying hands, and work extensively with Salmonella vaccines and in the real industry.
00:03:19
Speaker
and And I read in the brief 200 million layers and counting vaccinated. So I think that definitely qualifies as sort of building ah building expertise.
Evolution of Poultry Industry
00:03:28
Speaker
Over that period of time, 1970 onwards, the the industry has changed and changed and changed again. And here we are, you know, only last week we were talking about the the welfare bill and and the proposal to um to ban cages, so yeah production system, but scale, um not to mention treatment regimes, et cetera, breeds, they've all changed. Yannick, when you look back over your career and and that of of your forefathers, um how have things changed um and what's the environment out there now?
00:04:02
Speaker
It's fascinating journey and the egg sector is so unique because we're not subsidised. You have to be smart and work hard to survive in this sector. And it's almost full circle. We had free range, then the cage was developed, then the colony cage was developed, and our free ranges once again become the predominant production method.
Colony Cages vs. Free Range: Pros and Cons
00:04:24
Speaker
But what's so interesting about what I do is If you think about it, a colony cage is the ultimate test. A multi-age site, hundreds of thousands of birds in one place, a respiratory disease can grow up and blow round very quickly.
00:04:41
Speaker
So unless you have absolute control over IB, TRT, ILT, on a colony site, it just doesn't work. But now what have we got in free range?
00:04:52
Speaker
With the density of free range houses, all we've done is created almost a really big geographic colony site. Yeah, we're emulating that same sort of stocking density that you're talking about with indoor cages.
00:05:08
Speaker
Well, we've also opened opened up the pop holes and let the birds go out and fraternise with the local birds as well. And enjoy a muddy puddle or two. Yes, I mean, the whole point of a colony cage was they would have control of coxial worms.
00:05:21
Speaker
So what's the answer? You get them away from nature. And now we've reintroduced them to nature. So a lot of things have come back in. I mean, how do you control aggression? If you put a bird in a colony cage, your pecking order suddenly changes a bit. But now we've got a colony system going to barn. And all of a sudden, intense stockmanship comes to the fore again. So it it all goes full circle. it's It's interesting to watch it transpire.
00:05:46
Speaker
So in terms of your work then, Dave, as someone that's not as familiar with the ah with the laying industry, is is most of your work done with on pullet rearers or is it or is it done on site with birds in production?
Importance of Vaccination in Poultry Management
00:05:59
Speaker
What we... You end up with like unique skill sets and it's very niche what we do. So what I do is I get a live vaccine out the fridge into that bird in its live state.
00:06:12
Speaker
So that means i work I work on behalf of the Landco with regards to teaching people how to use Salmonella vaccine. I'm very proud of that because the UK has got one the lowest Salmonella prevalence rates in the world because the farmers work so hard and we work hard to make sure that they're supported.
00:06:28
Speaker
But I work with everything. so The laying industry, we've always had any layers we're involved with control IB. What's happened is we've picked more customers and it's become more and more free range and as the market's changed. So I work right from that bird gets, it's getting delivered onto rearing site to the end of its laying period.
00:06:50
Speaker
And that period of time gets ever longer. I mean, I started it was 70 weeks you'd deplete that. Now what we're looking at, we see 110 weeks. So the years go by faster as well.
00:07:04
Speaker
So, and in terms of the main pillars then for effective vaccination, then if you could distill those for us, what, where would you start with those? um You have a lot of things in life where people go, it's just vaccinated.
00:07:17
Speaker
It's easy. You just do that. just do this. But, When you get it right, it's worth about five extra eggs per hen. When you get it right in the laying house, when you get it right in the living house. So in terms of monetary comeback, it's huge. And I think that's one thing that a lot of people don't realise, I think, in my experience when they're vaccinating is they don't understand necessarily the cost of disease. Because if if you're if you're looking after a flock of birds and they have a disease, you know your result at the end isn't as good. but It's quite rare, actually, that the person doing the vaccinating crunches the numbers and says, well, look, this this job that I'm doing today, if I get it wrong and the birds get IB, actually, this could wipe X amount of thousand off of the ah offer off off of the bottom line, you know. and and And if you thought about it in that way, then you you really pay attention, don't you?
00:08:08
Speaker
but What tends to happen is you kind of you draw a lot of people that are like you. It just seems to be a rule in life. And I'm very much detail orientated. So you end with the very detail orientated farmers.
00:08:20
Speaker
So if I take on somebody new I say, right, sit down with the vet. We need to do X, Y, Z. We need to make sure all your team are fully trained up. And I say review it after a flock.
00:08:31
Speaker
And if it doesn't work, don't ever do it again. Say goodbye to me, it's all fine. You've tried it, nothing lost. But that doesn't happen. We don't lose people. We keep people because it works. Where I'd say it goes wrong is, this is a bit of a journey.
00:08:47
Speaker
But first of all, you have to understand that every bird needs to drink enough virus particles for the immunogenic effect to hit viruses. So if you're not stabilizing your vaccine, so stabilizing vaccine means stopping it dying.
00:09:05
Speaker
So once a live vaccine is mixed, it starts dying straight away. And we develop certain products like Aviblu and different things in conjunction with other people that kept vaccine alive. So you need to keep that live vaccine stored properly.
00:09:20
Speaker
You need to mix it and suspend it properly in the water so it stays alive. And then you need to know how to make sure every hen in that house receives a dose of that vaccine. And I mean, sorry, go on. No, I was going to ask you, Dave, that that sort of points to a question I had in in my ears. You've got training, you've mentioned training and the work that you're doing to um improve, I guess, the application rather than the awareness that the vaccine is required. It's got to be about getting the vaccine into the bird. And this is what you're now speaking of. But how do you know if the job has been done well? You might know how to do it well, but how do you make sure that you've actually succeeded?
00:09:58
Speaker
It's called the bottom line. So at the end of that flock, what's it done? And if you're doing this this job on behalf of a pullet reader, it's does that customer return to buy your pullets?
00:10:11
Speaker
And the the ways that you know a vaccination has been done correctly is you have to understand if the vaccine is in its live state when it's consumed, and you have to understand that the birds have consumed the vaccine.
00:10:23
Speaker
So we've done a lot of this called vaccine recovery work. So you'll mix and prepare the vaccine, but then you'll take a sample from the end of the waterline after a period of one and a half hours, say, and you'll make sure it's in its live state. So they'll do virus recovery on it.
00:10:37
Speaker
So we know it's alive for that long. Then how do we know that we've actually had each bird drink it? This, in my wife's words, makes me the most boring man in Britain, the fact that I enjoy this. This is the question I'm asking you, so I'm right behind you in boring states. Everybody's interested to someone.
00:10:57
Speaker
So how I do that is it's called tongs staining. It's a very old method. But what I'll do is I'll mix up the amount of water I've calculated and I believe to be true, and I will put a very large amount of blue dye in it.
00:11:10
Speaker
I'll be blue in this case. Then what I'll do is after my stock solution has been consumed and I've used the method that I use, I'll pick up 200, 300, 400 birds, I'll open their mouth and I'll score how blue blue their tongue is on a scale of 1 to 3.
00:11:29
Speaker
So I know with my methods we refine everything. So now we're at point where I can consistently get 96 to 98, 99%.
00:11:38
Speaker
And I've compared it to other methods that I see in the field and they can be hitting 60%. how um How commonplace is it for people to do serology um to test for T2 levels? Because certainly when when I was on breeders, that that would be a ah pretty regular thing that we do a couple of times and particularly at 22 weeks to make sure that all of the vaccines had had been effective.
00:11:59
Speaker
Serology is incredibly important. So you need serology. When you're working in the laying industry, that we use serology on all of our birds. So with every bird, we want to see their serology at 14 weeks after they've added the bulk their lives to check the live administration. Then we'll do serology at 24 weeks.
00:12:17
Speaker
What we should see in that serology is a jump up of the teeter or the level of immune cells in that bird. from say 4 to 6 for certain diseases like Newcastle to about 8 to 10 usually.
00:12:29
Speaker
And we know that that bird's had its live vaccines properly and then it's inactivated properly and it's had a robust response. So that's how you would check for the actual physical administration of it. it's It's a muddy picture though using serology in a laying hen.
00:12:49
Speaker
Because if you're checking for antibodies to IB, They've already received several vaccines in rear. They may have been vaccinated in lay.
00:13:00
Speaker
If they get a field challenge, that will raise their teeters also. So it's very performance-based understanding your level of control of IB in laying hens. How many seconds do you get? How much secondary E. coli do you get?
00:13:14
Speaker
And what's your mortality rate? Have you got suppressed feed, suppressed water? So it is good old fashioned stockmanship. You're actually observing the hen, how it's behaving rather than relying on a metric, ah such as, you know, such as sorology testing.
00:13:28
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. Well, I know, and I can see now why you go to the tongue staining, because that's, that's where you're really looking at that specific vaccine, aren't you? And you're looking at how effective that vaccine uptake has been.
00:13:39
Speaker
Once you know how long it lives for, and you know, you've got the birds, You almost have to take a legit logical jump to say, well, it's the strength a live vaccine in an adequate quantity.
00:13:49
Speaker
It's hard for it not to be vaccinated. While we're talking about blue tongues, I've just got a little anecdote which is springing to mind. um And that is, um I've got four children. And when we go on our summer holidays, we always end up somewhere by the seaside that's selling ice creams.
00:14:06
Speaker
And my children, for whatever reason, they'll have this wide selection of of of ice creams to go from and the flavour they always want is the bubblegum flavour and it's bright blue it it looks like it it shouldn't be good for you and we'll do everything that we can to persuade them to have something else but they want the bubblegum and why do they want it it's because it turns their tongue blue and they'll eat these ice creams and then they'll they'll spend the next hour showing showing each other their tongues ah and and and any other passerbys that are in the area so yeah you know it's it's it's
00:14:39
Speaker
The industries overlap, that's what I love about this game, is so we got a hold of a yellow food dye from a food production plant in the 80s, and we used that to to do the original tongue staining work.
00:14:53
Speaker
And now the blue that's in the avi blue is called Ultimate Blue, which is ah food colouring. So you just get a shed full of kids, really. I'm trying to think, yeah, if we could administer vaccines through through ice creams, we'd probably get very good uptake, wouldn't Thank you.
00:15:10
Speaker
Dave, ah vaccines and and vaccination, I guess, for um you know preventative measure to protect the bird based on what field challenge we expect them to to to encounter.
00:15:22
Speaker
and But you were talking a moment ago about you know the wider environment and water lines and and maybe the range, et cetera, et cetera. What are the kind of um practices or non-negotiables in in in the rest of the health picture that you know you pay special attention to and and what kind of advice would you give?
Comprehensive Poultry Health Management
00:15:42
Speaker
I think that how how I kind of see chickens, I see them almost like a car engine. So you wouldn't just say, right, I'm only going to put coolant in it, but no fuel and no water, no nothing else. I'm just going to put just coolant.
00:15:54
Speaker
I'll put any oil in there. How I see it is you have to control respiratory disease. You have to control parasite burden. You have to control water quality and you have to control the range.
00:16:08
Speaker
And no one part can be neglected. So it's the ability to actually lock in on each of those factors and make sure they're not that's not going to be the reason or it is not the current reason that that flock is struggling.
00:16:22
Speaker
Because it doesn't matter how well you vaccinate if you've got 20,000 red mites ahead. And it doesn't matter how much you vaccinate and then control red mite if your water quality is very poor and they're getting too high a dose of certain heavy minerals or there's a lot bacteria in there.
00:16:40
Speaker
So it it really is a question of controlling all of them. And again, when you talk about the range, I mean, and I know not many rangers are getting much heavy use at the moment. Not just at the moment. They're probably getting well rested. They probably need it.
00:16:54
Speaker
But if you worm consistently and you're not controlling worms, but your range looks like the song, then that's going to drive worm burden.
00:17:05
Speaker
So you have to do all of it. You have to do all of it If you've got sitting water in your range, you might be able to do just groundwork to reduce your need to use wormer if you take away the burden there.
00:17:19
Speaker
I always think of of bird health as being like just a big seesaw, isn't it? And there's things you can put on one side in terms of birds immunity. And ah and then there's things you can put on the other side in terms of disease challenge. And and ultimately, the whole but the whole bird is just a big seesaw. And you can put different things on to challenge or strengthen the bird in different places. But ultimately, it it's almost like this's it's ah it's a living being. and um And it's all interconnected. As you can say, you can do one thing fantastically. But if you put put enough problems in another area, then it will soon overpower it Is there one challenge, Dave, that you would you would point to in in in modern poultry, let's say let's say free range, given the number of units ah that that they represent as a proportion of the of the UK flock? is that Is there one kind of thing that you see as like the most frequent
00:18:06
Speaker
um you know challenge for for farmers to keep on top of that undermines flock health? I'd say the greatest challenge out there,
00:18:18
Speaker
Because it is challenging, because how many people are new to the sector? You go from no birds to 32,000 birds like that. It is challenging, but it's all the same thing. Farming is all the same thing.
00:18:30
Speaker
And it's a highly skilled job and there's a lot mouse to it. The thing that ah that the causes the most issues is that it's not just a chicken.
00:18:42
Speaker
It's not just a chicken, it's just like any other piece of livestock, you need to be in tune with how they sound, how they look, what your numbers are. It's actually just locking in on the hen and watching it.
00:18:56
Speaker
And then what you'll find is the farmer that will, or the manager, whoever it is, looks at that hen and looks its performance, they will naturally seek answers out in the world.
00:19:07
Speaker
and they will fix each thing as it comes up. But it's the ability to show the hen the respect of what an incredible machine it is. I always use the analogy of, um say I've got two lymphocchristies. Okay.
00:19:23
Speaker
We're going to go back in time, just because I'm showing my age It's the 80s. Brilliant. Love it. oh good but I'll go back too far. Two Usain Boltz. Let's do him instead. And I take one of them and I give him fleas and then I'm gonna give him worms and then I'm gonna give him water out of a puddle.
00:19:43
Speaker
Then I've got the other, Usain. And this Usain drinks good water, he eats good food, he hasn't got fleas, he hasn't got worms. And I give him four years of living like that between the Olympics, he wins.
00:19:57
Speaker
m It's that simple. They're just a performance animal. high performance, genetic masterpieces of engineering, but it's the farmer's job and my job and everyone else's job get them to not get in their way.
00:20:13
Speaker
We remove every controllable factor in our little circle and we nail that and we get it completely perfect. And then guess what? You don't have to look at the industry and what it's doing.
00:20:24
Speaker
Because your check your chickens are doing the maximum output for what they're eating and drinking and the cost your building. is drilling it down to just maximizing every variable of performance and just letting them get out their own way.
00:20:40
Speaker
And focusing focusing on things that are within your circle of influence. But you're right. Inevitably, quite often we spend most of our time talking about things that are external, don't we? you know whatever Whatever Trump's done this week or you know whatever government government decides their next next policy angle is going to be. But you're right. The consistency comes from from focusing on your own operation.
00:21:05
Speaker
I'm trying to think if I'm listening to this as ah as a producer, I'm i'm i'm wanting you know a takeaway message here. And on on one hand, it's um you know vaccines pre-lay and vaccines during lay.
00:21:17
Speaker
yeah yeah Absolutely. yeah Every six weeks to six to eight weeks. And on the other hand, there's manage what you can manage on your site. you know Water. water Cleanliness, hygiene, absolutely. part of it. I guess the rest of the environment, litter quality, air quality, um enrichment, the whole piece about removing as much as possible any stress from that environment. They're the there are things. But just, and still, if i'm if I'm a producer, not quite clear on what I can be doing differently today, or tomorrow, the next day. What are my take-home messages? For example, okay vaccination,
00:21:54
Speaker
is it a case that more vaccination is you know more protection, it's it's an insurance policy um that that will better support health or is there ever a case where too much vaccination can undermine the health of the bird, you know provides too much challenge? yeah where's the Where's the line and and what are the take home messages?
Advanced Poultry Farming Challenges
00:22:16
Speaker
The things i always say when I speak to a free range farm in particular, first of all, you need to vaccinate correctly. If you vaccinate correctly, you will not need too frequent an interval but you will still need enough.
00:22:30
Speaker
The vaccine will only protect for so long. Past 8 weeks, limited protection from IB vaccines. So if you set your interval at 10 weeks, no matter how well you vaccinate, you will get IB.
00:22:42
Speaker
So you need to have the correct interval of vaccination, the correct administration of the vaccination, And then you need to look at anything that's having a corrosive effect on the birds. So you go in there with open eyes. You don't see what you want to see. You see what's there.
00:22:58
Speaker
Have I got red mite? Am I observing the red mite? Do I know how to observe the red mite? Do I need someone to come in and just take me through it? How much red mite is too much red mite? Because I oversee a lot of birds and a lot of their performance. I like performance. That's my thing. And I was there at the launch of Exel.
00:23:14
Speaker
I knew when that product came out with how much our our clients trusted us, it had to work. it was too expensive not to work when it was launched. So we did lots of work on how many red mites represent a loss of production, how many red mites equal a loss of bird numbers, when do you need to treat, what's an acceptable level.
00:23:34
Speaker
And for the pharma, their take home is to vaccinate and make sure that they get technical support. I help the whole industry. So even if you're not my customer, I will come and spend time with you as long as the vet's okayed it and everyone's okay in the chain.
00:23:48
Speaker
But that's that's what I do. you help You help people as much as you can. Get your vaccine nailed, get your red mic nailed, as in they understand what you're doing with the systems, how to observe them, how to manage them.
00:23:59
Speaker
Check your water quality, there's lots of very skilled water engineers out there, get your water quality right. And this magical thing happens. When all of those are in place, it's very rare for the wheels to fall off.
Impact of Red Mite and Modern Treatments
00:24:12
Speaker
And the profit in this game, because it's families lot of the time, building these free range units, the profit and the ability to enjoy your job comes from having in one good flock after another.
00:24:23
Speaker
Not hoping you get a good flock, but not doing any proactive measures to make sure you do. That's the key to making it fun. Building on the success of the previous flock and avoiding the mistakes that may have been made. Learn from those and and then keep doing the positive things.
00:24:40
Speaker
And you only ever get so many problems. That's the thing. If my phone goes 50 times a day, it'll be 50 times where it's conversations about IB, E. coli, red mite, worms.
00:24:51
Speaker
Let me go back to red mite just for a moment, because you mentioned ah a brand name there in Exalt. And obviously that's been on the market for what you'll tell me, but it's got to be a decade. But yeah the the way of operating was very different compared to red mite treatment products of of previous generation. And I guess those are still in use.
00:25:13
Speaker
yeah to the To anyone listening who's not using that, what would your kind of message be about efficacy of that product versus the um you know the slurry products or whatever there might be? what's the What's your experience of of its efficiency?
00:25:32
Speaker
and i can I can qualify this with I've done a lot of spraying for red mite with a lot of different products and a lot of systems. Exalt when it was launched there was a certain amount of skepticism about what it would do.
00:25:48
Speaker
But this is the brilliant thing about our industry that's quite unique. We observe what each input does so accurately to decide whether it's worth investing in or not that if it doesn't work it dies.
00:26:02
Speaker
And it's so true, seen so many products come to the market that claim they do something and they're not there five years later. So Exalt came along. What immediately saw reduced E. coli, highly reduced mortality, better bird quality, better egg quality, better feather cover, reduced feed intake from better feather cover,
00:26:24
Speaker
It's just a litany of things, even down to, even down to little things like the staff not complaining because they've got red mite living in their clothes. m Well, that's certainly what I remember from, um, not a lot of red mite on breeders, but if you did have it, yeah, you, uh, you, you didn't look forward to collecting those eggs. That's for sure.
00:26:43
Speaker
And you know, that it's so funny how the industry changes. So when I got into it, it was a job for life. If you went into chickens, that's what you did. You were a chicken person. You were stock when you were a manager. Now it's a much more transient industry.
00:26:56
Speaker
People move through it, people move from other industries into it. And it has to be a hospitable environment for both the person working in the shed and for the chicken. And I just, the the key bit that I take away from observing this whole industry is nobody loses if you make a hen healthier.
00:27:18
Speaker
The farmer makes more money because he gets more eggs. The industry is seen as having healthy hens that can live a long time. The only reason a hen goes to 90 weeks now when it's brown when it went to 70 is because we've got better at what we do.
00:27:35
Speaker
We've got better at keeping them healthier. So i've I've been all over the world been very lucky. Nobody does it like the UK. Like the way we look after our hens and the the time we put into it is world leading.
UK Poultry Practices and Global Leadership
00:27:48
Speaker
And for the whole industry, the more we all focus on just controlling disease, controlling parasites, controlling lighting conditions, making that hen as healthy as possible, everybody wins.
00:27:59
Speaker
More eggs, more sites. Farms can expand because they're doing better. Obviously, i provide veterinary products that can be used to help, you know, obviously in these things.
00:28:11
Speaker
But nobody loses by a hen producing more eggs. Hmm. And that's probably a fantastic note to ah to wrap it up with, Dave. So thank you very much for sharing some of your extensive knowledge with us.
00:28:24
Speaker
um And it sounds like you've got a lot more knowledge, so maybe we should get you back at some point to to talk about a couple of different couple of different issues as well. Lovely to thank you both. Appreciate
00:28:40
Speaker
What a great guy.
Episode Conclusion and Reflections
00:28:41
Speaker
Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. I've never actually heard ah Dave speak, although I've i've heard an awful lot about him. um Yeah. He's wonderfully enthusiastic. I've been to various conferences where he's taken to the microphone and and and and talked about.
00:28:58
Speaker
and the importance of vaccination or whatever it whatever it might be. But um no really good to do ah do a session with a guest that I hope um has delivered some some useful tips and and good value to those at kind of grassroots level.
00:29:12
Speaker
And much as we said it was going to be about um technical focus for layers, I think a huge amount of the discussions on vaccine efficacy and administration and attention to detail and bird health is is completely relevant for broiler producers as well. So, yeah, I think i think he was a really interesting guy to have on.
00:29:31
Speaker
Hopefully the meat industry guys stuck through the episode. Thank you if you if you did. We should make it clear, shouldn't we, that we weren't sponsored by Exalt. We should have been. given the amount of air time and and and approval that that that that we we all gave it. but i think I think we're on commission now. i think I think that's how it works. I think we're on commission now for any sales on the back of this. and the money should be The money should be rolling in.
00:29:54
Speaker
Well, we hope you enjoyed the episode. If you're not already, then please do subscribe to um to our feed. Make sure that you don't miss an episode each week. And we'll look forward to welcoming you back next time.
00:30:06
Speaker
Great. See you again, Tom.