Effectiveness of physical barriers to prevent rodent presence in poultry farms on Argentina

Abstract

The rodent commensal species are abundant on Argentinian poultry farms, causing economic losses and disease transmission. Preventing rodent colonization through the construction of poultry sheds with specific barriers against the entry of rodents is an alternative to the application of rodenticides. This work aimed to assess the effect of physical barriers to prevent rodent presence in experimental poultry sheds. New experimental sheds with and without physical barriers were constructed on two poultry farms. The footprint index (FI) was used as an estimator of rodent abundance. Rodent footprints were never observed inside the Experimental-barrier sheds but they were observed outside. In Experimental-without barrier sheds, rodent footprints were recorded inside and outside. In both farms there were significant differences according to the treatment in FI inside sheds, while no significant differences were found between treatments in the mean FI outside sheds. Our results suggest that physical barriers successfully prevented the colonization of rodents inside the Experimental-barrier during the studied period of 21 months. The installation of physical barriers during poultry shed construction is recommended to prevent rodent colonization and minimize the use of anticoagulant rodenticides for rodent control.

Keywords:

• Rodents
• alternative control methods
• physical barriers
• footprint index
• poultry farms

Acknowledgements

We are very grateful to Ernesto Benavidez (Facultad de Agronomía – Universidad Nacional de Lomas de Zamora) who brought us in contact with the owners of the poultry farms. We also greatly acknowledge the farm owners who allowed us to work on their properties. We also thank Lucia Babino for her statistical advice. We sincerely appreciate the valuable comments and suggestions of the reviewers and editors of the journal, which helped us in improving the quality of the manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Availability of data

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author, [V.L], upon reasonable request.

Additional information

Funding

This work was funded by Universidad de Buenos Aires (UBACyT 20020130100282BA) and Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Tecnicas (PIP 1122015010022).