Effect of exercise on the vascular pattern in the bone extremities of broiler fowl

The vascular morphology of the proximal femur, tibiotarsus and tarsometatarsus was studied in growing broiler chicks. A carousel was used to exercise one group of 24 birds for four periods of 15 minutes each day. A second group (controls) were not exercised. Some birds were killed during the course of the experiment, and the remainder after 25 days of exercise when they were 33 days old. After killing the limbs were perfused and the bone extremities cleared. The bone extremities were then cut into 1 mm thick slabs and examined. There were abnormalities of the physis and physeal vasculature in 18 (25 per cent) of the bone extremities from the exercised birds and in 24 (40 per cent) of the bone extremities from the unexercised (control) birds. The low level of activity in the unexercised fowls of the present study appeared to contribute to these abnormalities.