A total of 100 samples of chicken-viscera were collected from different poultry-slaughtering houses in Austria; (20 samples of each of gizzard, heart, intestine, liver and spleen). Intestine and gizzard were heavy contaminated with moulds than other examined visceral organs (4.4x105 and 2.6x104 colonies/1 g of the samples, respectively). Fungal contamination was not detected in all samples of heart and spleen. Eighty-five mould isolates were collected from the examined samples, the majority of isolates belonging to Aspergillus glaucus group (20.0%) and Trichoderma (14.1%). These isolates comprised 15 species belonging to 9 genera. Members of Aspergillus glaucus (telomorph: Eurotium) group and Trichoderma were further confirmed their identification using random amplified polymorphic DNA-polymerase chain reaction (RAPD-PCR) technique.
Aspergillus ; Austria ; Chickens ; Gizzard ; Heart ; Intestines ; Liver ; Random Amplified Polymorphic DNA Technique* ; Spleen ; Trichoderma ; Viscera