C. Beaumont et al., Genetic resistance to mortality of day-old chicks and carrier-state of hens after inoculation with Salmonella enteritidis, AVIAN PATH, 28(2), 1999, pp. 131-135
The heritability of resistance of poultry to Salmonella enteritidis (SE) wa
s investigated. Three measurements of resistance were made: survival after
intramuscular inoculation of 419 day-old chicks, absence versus presence of
Salmonella in spleens and caeca 4 weeks after oral inoculation of 304 hens
at peak of laying, and antibody response of 228 hens following two inocula
tions of an aroA mutant of this serotype, In the first two models of infect
ion, resistance appeared to be heritable. The heritability was estimated fr
om the sire and dam components, respectively, at 0.14+/-0.10 and 0.62+/-0.1
6 for chick mortality, 0.47+/-0.21 and 0.13+/-0.26 for resistance to spleen
contamination, and 0.24+/-0.15 and 0.53+/-0.26 for resistance to caecal co
ntamination in laying hens. By contrast the estimated heritability of antib
ody response was very low (0.03+/-0.08 and 0.10+/-0.08 when estimated from
the sire and dam components, respectively). These results suggest that a se
lection for increased resistance to SE may be efficient.