Effect of access time to food on broilers fed on diets of differing nutrient concentration

Meal Feeding and Broiler Performance

“…However, in a hot environment, meal feeding substantially improved feed conversion with no effect on body weight. At first, it might appear that these data are in disagreement with Yule et al (1979), who found an improvement in feed conversion in "winter" and no effect on weight or feed conversion in "summer". However, the work by Yule et al (1979) was done in Australia 'Trials 3 and 4 meal feeding time, 17 to 32 days, 3.5 hr on:4.5 hr off, 3 cycles per 24 hr; 32 to 42 days, 2 hr on:2 hr off, 6 cycles per 24 hr.…”

“…Therefore, based on the work reported both here and by Yule et al (1979), it can be concluded that meal feeding might improve feed conversion during times of both cold and hot weather stress but is of no advantage, or perhaps degrades performance, if growing temperature is optimum.…”

“…Penetration of moisture into mash was rapid, but pellets could still be seen in crop contents 6 hr after ingestion. Yule et al (1979) found that results with restricted feeding may depend on environmental temperature. Using 23 hr of light/day and restricting access to feed for 8 hr each day, they found that during cold weather (outside temperature 8.9 C, inside not specified) feed conversion was significantly improved from 2.15 to 2.11 with no effect on growth rate.…”