Experimental infection of chicks with Arizona hinshawii

One-day old chicks were infected with an Arizona hinshawii organism either subcutaneously or orally. Fifty two percent of the subcutaneously infected but none of the orally infected birds died within 10 days of infection. The incubation period ranged from 20 hours to 12 days. Symptoms of pasty vent, opacity of the lens of one or both eyes, tremors of the head, opisthotonous, twisting of the neck and paresis in the legs were observed. Postmortem examination of dead birds revealed septicaemia, enlargement of the gall bladder, engorgement of the ureters with urates and unabsorbed yolk sac. The inoculated organism could be recovered from the internal organs of all dead birds. Shedding of arizona in the faeces of infected birds continued up to the 28th and 49th day after infection in the subcutaneously- and orally-infected birds respectively. Results of the microagglutination test revealed that 71.4% of the subcutaneously and 55% of the orally infected birds had detectable agglutinins in the period from the 4th to the 8th week after infection.