Adenoviral Gizzard Erosions in Commercial Layer Chickens

Abstract

This case report describes a series of gizzard erosion outbreaks in two farms of commercial layers flocks at the age of 19, 25, 30 and 73 weeks observed in the period between 2012 and 2015. The clinical signs, course of disease and mortality in all cases were similar. The post-mortem examinations revealed dark-brownish contents in crops, esophagus, proventriculus, gizzards, and duodenums, as well as haemorrhagic changes in provetriculus and ablations of the overlaying keratinoid layers in the gizzards. Histopathology showed the presence of intranuclear inclusion bodies in gizzard epithelial cells and molecular findings confirmed the presence of fowl adenoviruses A. It seems that the virus persisted on the farm during this fouryear period and temperature fluctuations were to be the probable factors predisposing the clinical course of disease.

Pathogenesis of Gizzard Erosion and Ulcerations and Comprehensive Control Strategy in Poultry

“…Microbial invasion accounts for a large proportion of GEU epidemics. In previous studies, fowl adenovirus (FAdV-1, FAdV-4, FAdV-A) has been linked to GEU in broilers and layers in Japan, South Korea, Germany, Poland, Italy, Sweden and China (Ono et al 2001;Lim et al 2012;Schade et al 2013;Zhang et al 2017;Domanska-Blicharz and Bartczak 2019;Wang et al 2021;Lindgren et al 2022). The opportunistic bacteria Clostridium perfringens was also identified in commercial hens with gizzard ulcerations (Wang et al 2021).…”