Premium
Impact of Rearing Conditions on the Microbiological Quality of Raw Retail Poultry Meat
Author(s) -
Hardy Bridgshe,
Crilly Nate,
Pendleton Sean,
Andino Ana,
Wallis Audra,
Zhang Nan,
Hanning Irene
Publication year - 2013
Publication title -
journal of food science
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.772
H-Index - 150
eISSN - 1750-3841
pISSN - 0022-1147
DOI - 10.1111/1750-3841.12212
Subject(s) - salmonella , campylobacter , food science , broiler , poultry meat , aerobic bacteria , biology , raw meat , veterinary medicine , poultry farming , plate count , bacteria , medicine , genetics , ecology
There is a gap in knowledge of microbiological quality in raw chicken products produced by nonconventional methods and no studies have reported the microbiological quality of turkeys produced under different rearing environments. Thus, the aim of this study was to compare the microbiological quality of conventionally and organically reared whole chicken and turkey carcasses purchased from 3 retail outlets in Knoxville, Tenn., U.S.A. A total of 100 raw broiler chickens organically ( n = 50) and 50 raw turkey carcasses consisting of 3 brands reared either conventionally ( n = 25) or organically ( n = 25) were evaluated. The FDA BAM protocol for rinsing poultry carcasses was used to enumerate of aerobic bacteria, Campylobacter , and Staphylococcus spp., and for qualitative analysis of Salmonella . Organic chickens from one brand had the highest average counts of aerobic bacteria, Staphylococcus spp. and Campylobacter (4.8, 4.8, and 4.7 Log 10 CFU/mL rinsate, respectively) while the other organic brand had the lowest average counts (3.4, 3.3, and 3.1, respectively) of all 4 brands evaluated. The organic turkeys had the highest average counts of these same bacteria (4, 3.9, and 3.8, respectively) compared to the 2 brands of conventional turkeys evaluated. Salmonella (5% prevalence) was isolated only from organic chickens and turkeys. From these data, it appears that the microbiological quality of the raw product was not dependent on rearing conditions and, thus, it cannot be assumed that organic raw poultry is safer than conventionally raised poultry in terms of microbiological quality.