At the laboratory samples shall be kept refrigerated until examination, which shall be started within 48 hours following receipt and within 96 hours after sampling.

The pair(s) of boot/sock swabs shall be carefully unpacked to avoid dislodging adherent faecal material, pooled and placed in 225 ml buffered peptone water (BPW) which has been pre-warmed to room temperature. The boot/sock swabs shall be fully immersed in BPW and therefore more BPW may be added if necessary.

The dust sample shall preferably be analysed separately. However for fattening flocks, the competent authority may decide to allow it to be pooled with the pair of boot/sock swabs for analysis.

The sample shall be swirled to fully saturate it and culture shall be continued by using the detection method set out in point 3.2.

Other samples (e.g. from breeding flocks or hatcheries) shall be prepared in accordance with point 2.2.2 of the Annex to Regulation (EU) No 200/2010.

If standards of European Committee for Standardisation (‘CEN’) or the International Organisation for Standardisation (‘ISO’) on the preparation of faeces for the detection of Salmonella are agreed on, they shall be applied and replace the provisions on the preparation of samples set out in this point.

The detection of Salmonella spp. shall be carried out according to EN ISO 6579-1.

For breeding flocks of turkeys, at least one isolate from each positive sample shall be serotyped, following the White-Kauffmann-Le Minor scheme.

For fattening flocks of turkeys, at least one isolate from each positive sample taken by the competent authority shall be serotyped, following the White-Kauffmann-Le Minor scheme.

Food business operators shall at least ensure that for all isolates none of them belong to the serotypes Salmonella Enteritidis or Salmonella Typhimurium including monophasic strains with the antigenic formula X11,4,[5],12:i:-.

Alternative methods may be used instead of the methods for detection and serotyping provided for in points 3.1, 3.2 and 3.3 of this Annex, if validated in accordance with EN ISO 16140-2 (for alternative detection methods).

Laboratories shall ensure that at least one isolated strain of Salmonella spp. per flock and per year can be collected by the competent authority and stored for possible future phage typing or anti-microbial susceptibility testing, using the normal methods for culture collection, which must ensure integrity of the strains for a minimum of two years from the date of analysis.

The competent authority may decide that isolates of Salmonella spp. from sampling by food business operators shall also be stored for future phagetyping or antimicrobial susceptibility testing to provide for isolates to be tested in accordance with Article 2 of Commission Decision 2007/407/EC11.