Method of producing avian eggs and birds of germ-free status

Abstract

The invention provides a method of rearing a bird of germ-free status. The method comprises housing a bird as a parent bird, surgically removing an egg in its shell from the parent bird prior to transfer of the egg to the cloaca in the parent bird, incubating the egg still in its shell and hatching the egg to produce a laying bird. The invention also relates to the production of avian eggs of germ-free status.

Description

[0001] This is a divisional application of application Ser. No. 10 / 788,338, filed Mar. 1, 2004, which is a continuation-in-part of application Ser. No. 10 / 255,097, filed Sep. 26, 2002.FIELD OF THE INVENTION [0002] The present invention relates to a method of rearing a bird of germ-free status. It further relates to the production of avian eggs of germ-free status. It also relates to a method of producing various eggs and birds. [0003] In this specification, the term “germ-free” is used very broadly and relates to many pathogens and infections that can be carried by birds, particularly, poultry such as chickens and turkeys which are used widely to produce flocks of birds for breeding to produce fertile eggs for commercial production and to produce eggs and meat for human consumption. Further, such eggs and birds are used in the manufacture of a wide range of biological substances including vaccines, fibroblasts and proteins, both for therapeutic and prophylactic use in people and ani...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

[0020] Indeed, the sterility can be further improved by feeding the laying birds, in the sterile environment, with food containing normal gutflora or sterile food. It will be appreciated that when birds are hatched which are not laying birds, they will then be retained for subsequent fertilisation of the laying birds. In this way, the whole flock can be sterile.

[0023] As stated above not all of the steps of the method have to be performed in a sterile environment. It is necessary that the step of removing the egg from the parent bird prior to the transfer of the egg to the cloaca in the parent bird is performed in a sterile environment. The advantage of this is that the egg is not contaminated during removal of the egg. Additionally after removing the egg from the parent bird in a sterile environment the steps of incubating the egg in its shell, hatching the egg to produce a laying bird, housing the laying bird and using the laying bird to lay the egg should also be carried out in a sterile environment to retain the sterility of the egg produced from the parent bird, the laying bird hatched from that egg and the egg produced from the laying bird. The steps carried out prior to removal of the egg from the parent bird such as housing a bird or obtaining a flock of birds may be carried out in a sterile or non-sterile environment.

Problems solved by technology

As an eggshell is porous external contamination is a major problem.

Thus, initially, when the laying birds are produced, they will not form a flock of sufficiently germ-free status and it will be necessary to continue the process until birds of the desired germ-free status are obtained.