Thursday, March 28, 2024
Poultry

Importance of a Poultry Farm Entrance Foot Bath

Poultry Pen Routine Maintenance: Why Foot Bath at the entrance of the Poultry pen is Necessary and How often the water and disinfectant must be changed.

The foot bath is a part of the poultry pen that is carved put, where water and disinfectant is poured for attendants to dip their feet each time they are to enter the poultry house. It is necessary because it prevents the spread of diseases from the outside to the pen house and from one pen house to another.

A footbath is a very simple form of biosecurity that helps prevent the potential spread of disease. Organisms have the potential to survive for several days or weeks in the dirt stuck to the bottom of your shoes. Footbaths can eliminate these organisms.

With regards to how often you need to change the water and the disinfectant in the foot bath, well changing the water and disinfectant in a foot bath should be one of the first daily routine activities of the farm attendants. In fact, in some farms it is a punishable offense for attendants not to change the water and disinfectant daily.

Dirty boots can pose a very real risk to your property. People can unintentionally carry pest or disease-causing organisms on unwashed footwear, bringing them on to your farm without even realising it.

Soil-borne pests (like phylloxera, anthrax, Panama disease) and weed seeds are carried in dirt and mud. Pieces of infected plant material, manure and soil itself can carry diseases directly from one farm to the next.

A very simple way to manage this biosecurity risk is to ensure that visitors and staff who need to access your production areas thoroughly wash and disinfect their footwear.

In particular, high risk visitors who have been on other farms in the area recently should be asked to clean their shoes or change their footwear before moving onto your property.

People who are simply dropping in at the house and not coming into contact with your crops or livestock are a low risk and do not need to do this.

There are three simple rules when allowing visitors and workers to wear their own footwear in your production areas:

  1. Check all visitors and workers boots and ask where they were worn previously
  2. Clean footwear with a brush to remove debris, and then wash with water to remove all visible plant material and soil
  3. Disinfect footwear using a footbath containing a strong sanitising product. You could also use a spray bottle to treat shoes with a disinfecting solution. Be sure to follow the use instructions on the product label.

Provision of a footbath at the entrance to the poultry house is very important. People entering the poultry house must maintain high levels of hygiene. This prevents the birds from diseases and parasites.

Hence, a footbath at the entrance (of the poultry house) will enable the people entering the house to deep their feet in the disinfectant contained in a footbath. The disinfectant can destroy the parasites which might be carried by people on their feet.

Read Also: Poultry Farm Bio-security and Vaccination

Cleaning step of the Poultry Farm Foot Bath

Before washing, use a strong bristled brush to remove all visible debris. Boots should be free of dirt, mud, manure and plant material before using the footbath. These kinds of organic matter quickly contaminate the water and prevent the disinfectant from killing germs, so the boots need to be generally clean before you wash and disinfect.

Washing step of the Poultry Farm Foot Bath

The footbath should be a container which allows easy access. Ensure the container can fit a large boot so that the liquid saturates all parts of the footwear. Adding some soap or detergent to the water can clean better than using water alone. If shoes were very dirty to begin with, use the scrubbing brush while standing in the soap solution to thoroughly clean the soles of the shoe.

Poultry Farm Foot Bath Wears

Sometimes it’s more practical to have a supply of shoes available for visitors or workers to wear on farm.

Disinfection step

  • For maximum cleaning a disinfection step should follow the washing step.
  • A second footbath should contain disinfecting products. These must be refreshed regularly as build-up of dirt and rain water in these solutions will lessen their effectiveness.
  • You can use bleach diluted to 1% active sodium hypochlorite (the active ingredient in bleach). For example, dilute a bleach solution which is 4% active sodium hypochlorite using three parts water to one part bleach.
  • Any other farm detergents and disinfectants can also be used as per label instructions.
  • As leather or fabric shoes can be damaged by prolonged exposure to disinfectants, a final rinse with fresh water is advised.

Dedicated footwear

An alternative to washing boots every time someone enters or exits a production area is to provide visitors or workers with a change of shoes (e.g. gumboots) or disposable shoe covers that are only worn in the production areas. This will minimise the chance of transferring diseases, pests or weeds both on and off your property.

The boots will still need to be washed to keep them generally clean, but because they are only being worn in the production area they will not be a source of new diseases, pests or weeds.

Read Also: Best Ways to Prevent and Control Coccidiosis among Poultry Birds

Footwear hygiene

Footbaths are a useful and inexpensive method of cleaning footwear before entering and exiting production areas of a property. To set up a footbath station you will need:

  • heavy-duty scrubbing brushes and scraping tools such as a horse pick or a screwdriver
  • at least two heavy-duty plastic containers
  • water for the footbath and rinse tub
  • registered decontaminant (check the APVMA database; see below for further details)
  • drying material: something clean, porous and non-slip, such as hessian bags, rubber mats or towels and
  • a tarpaulin (if footbaths are to be placed on a dirt surface).

Preparing the footbath

Set up each footbath station on a flat surface.

  • Fill the first plastic container with clean water for washing off any soil and plant material prior to the decontamination process.
  • Fill the second footbath with a registered decontaminant to prevent the spread of soil-borne diseases. Follow the label instructions.
  • Lay drying material after each of the clean water and decontamination footbaths.

Scrubbing brushes and scraping tools should be provided to guests to assist with cleaning.

After the footbaths have been used, dispose of the water and decontaminant away from production areas and water sources. Take note of label instructions for disposal of the decontaminant.

Agric4Profits

Benadine Nonye is an agricultural consultant and a writer with over 12 years of professional experience in the agriculture industry. - National Diploma in Agricultural Technology - Bachelor's Degree in Agricultural Science - Master's Degree in Science Education... Visit My Websites On: 1. Agric4Profits.com - Your Comprehensive Practical Agricultural Knowledge and Farmer’s Guide Website! 2. WealthinWastes.com - For Effective Environmental Management through Proper Waste Management and Recycling Practices! Join Me On: Twitter: @benadinenonye - Instagram: benadinenonye - LinkedIn: benadinenonye - YouTube: Agric4Profits TV and WealthInWastes TV - Pinterest: BenadineNonye4u - Facebook: BenadineNonye

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