[Experimental poisoning of pheasant chicks with nitrates and nitrites in drinking water]

The effect was studied of nitrates and nitrites in drinking water on the methemoglobin level in blood and pathomorphological changes in fourteen-day-old pheasant chickens. The concentrations of 500 ppm of NO3- and 15 ppm NO2- in the drinking water were not lethal, they caused only the increase in the methemoglobin in blood to 7.1% (NO3-) and 16.5% (NO2-). The pheasants exposed to NO3- suffered from hyperaemia of liver, kidneys and mucosa of the small intestine and from the multiplication of the eosinophilic granulocytes in the villus stroma. The exposition to NO2- resulted in the non-specific dystrophic changes in liver and kidneys and in the villus edema of the small intestine. Lethal levels of nitrates and nitrites in drinking water were estimated in relation to the age of pheasants.