Comparison of performance and digestibility characteristics of broilers fed diets containing treated hulled barley or hulless barley

Abstract

This study was performed with growing chickens (14 to 56 days of age) to evaluate the effects of feeding a barley-based diet. The treatments were maize diet (1) as a control, barley diet with (4) or without (2) the commercial enzyme β-glucanase, barley treated with rumen fluid without protozoa (3) and hulless barley (5). The effects of treatments were investigated in a 42-day trial using 360 sexed broiler chickens. In a digestibility trial, 15 male broiler chicks were used at 45 days of age. In this regard, five treatments were offered to chickens in three replications individually. The experimental design for performance investigation was a completely randomised one with a 5 × 2 factorial arrangement of treatments. Each of the five treatments was replicated three times per sex (n = 3). The levels of barley in treatments (2) to (5) were 35% during the growing (14 to 42 days) and finishing (42 to 52 days) period. At the end of trial, two birds from each pen were selected and slaughtered. Blood samples were taken just before slaughter of birds. No significant differences (P > 0.05) were observed between (3) to (5) treatments with maize diet in weight gains, feed intake and feed conversion, but barley with no treatment (2) showed lower weight gain compared to the enzyme treatment and hulless barley diet (P < 0.05). Ether extract digestibility decreased significantly in all barley diets compared with maize diet (P < 0.05). Digestibility of DM, CP, and NFE was lower in barley diet with no treatment, in comparison with other treatments (P < 0.05). Reduction of serum cholesterol was observed in birds on hulless barley diet (P < 0.05), but serum triacylglycerols and glucose did not show any significant differences between treatments (P > 0.05). Mean percentage yield of breast showed the highest percentage in barley diet with no treatment (P < 0.05) and abdominal fats were produced in lowest amounts in carcasses on hulless barley diets (P < 0.05).    

Effects of dietary short- and medium-chain fatty acids on performance, carcass traits, jejunum morphology, and serum parameters of broiler chickens

“…Conversely, gall bladder relative weight tended to reduce in MCFA treatments. Therefore, MCFAs may have special effects on lipid digestion and absorption and diminishing of energy consumption (Moharrery 2006); further researches are needed in this regard.…”

Performance and nutrient digestibility in broiler chicks as influenced by multienzyme addition to starter diets containing palm kernel meal

“…There was a significant (P<0.05) variation in fat digestibility in all the treatments which was higher in the control and enzyme treated diets compared to diets without enzyme supplementation. Salih et al (1991) and Moharrery, (2006) suggested that the low lipid digestibility in broilers chicken fed diets with a high content of NSPs might be due to bacterial overgrowth in the small intestine and subsequent excessive deconjugation of bile acids, which reduced their efficacy in solubilizing lipids. Sekoni et al (2008) reported an improvement in the body weight and feed conversion efficiency due to an increase in fat digestibility which consequently increased bioavailability of fat soluble vitamins and protein digestibility when enzyme maxigrain® was fed to broilers.…”

Drinking water supplementation of licorice (Glycyrrhiza glabra L. root) extract as an alternative to in-feed antibiotic growth promoter in broiler chickens

“…Conversely, in the current study, gall bladder weight reduced as a result of drinking water supplementation of LE (0.1 g/L of water). Therefore, LE may have exerted especial effects on lipid digestion and absorption, which could result in reduced energy consumption [30]; further experiments are necessary to confirm this result. Tominaga et al [9] established a hypothesis that the weight loss by LFO is due to reduction in fatty acid synthesis and enhancement of fatty acid oxidation in the liver, and lines of evidence exist confirming this supposition.…”