Bioclimatic behavior of free-range rustic broilers in enriched paddocks

This study was conducted to evaluate the effect of an enriched environment on the production system of free range rustic broilers, determining the influence of meteorological elements and behavioral responses of the broilers. The experiment was performed during a production cycle of 87 days at the Experimental Station of Small Animals of the Federal Rural University of Pernambuco, conducted in four production modules divided into four boxes with 10 birds per box, totaling 160 birds, subjected to four modules of production: access to paddock, access to paddock with perch, access to paddock with artificial shade, and access to paddock with perch and artificial shade. The experimental design was completely randomized (CRD), in split plots, with the means compared through the Tukey test. The production module with access to the paddock with perch and artificial shade offered the birds the best thermal comfort, having a mean enthalpy value of 75.95 kJ kg(-1), and were those that had better opportunity to express their natural behavior and to explore the environment outside the production module, thus increasing their well-being.