THE EFFECTS ON FEED PERFORMANCE AND CARCASS FEATURES OF CHICK
QUALITY AND PRE-STARTER FEED APPLICATION IN BROILER CHICKS
Murat Durmuş
1, Harun Cinli
1, İslim Polat Açık
1, Meltem Kalkan Tufan
1, Hasan Rüştü Kutlu
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Agricultural Faculty, Department of Animal Science, Çukurova University, Adana,
* Corresponding author. Tel.: +90 5419033191 E-mail address: durmusm@cu.edu.tr
Introduction: With the increase of the population, it has become inevitable to increase the production of poultry meat and to increase the quality of poultry meat production in order to meet the increasing demand for animal food and to ensure that people are fed on a balanced basis. There are many factors affecting the economy, quantity and quality in poultry meat production (genetic factors, herd age, hatching egg quality, egg collection time, egg storage, hatching temperature, chick quality etc.).
These factors include a long period of time from the feeding of breeding animals to the cutting of chickens. Depending on the effects of all these factors, chicks are produced in different qualities. Among these factors, chick quality is the most essential for high efficiency as it is a combination of all other parameters. Because the quality of daily chicks is very important for a good start and cutting performance in production (Meijerhof, 2009). The present study was conducted to determine parameters to be used in chicks quality classification after incubation and investigate the effects of pre-starter feeding in the first five days on fattening period lasting 35-40 days for chicks classified low and high quality.
Materials and Methods: Experimental chicks after hatching, were divided according to their gender and then divided into two treatment groups as high quality and low quality. Each treatment group was then divided into 2 feeding -groups, which received control and pre-starter feed (promoting the development of the digestive system during the first 5 days, special feed given a total of 100 gr per chick) thus is created from receiving chick four treatment -groups. In the experiment, total 800 chicken were used, which consisted of 5 replicates of each treatment group and consisted of 40 chicks (20 male, 20 female) of each replicates. Feed and water were given to the chicks as ad libitum. The chicks were subjected to weekly weighing to calculate living weight gain, feed consumption and feed conversion rate.
Result: The results of the study showed that live weight in the initial experiment is effect by chick quality (P<0.05). However, pre-initiation feeding and chick quality haven’t significant effect on live weight gain, feed consumption, feed conversion rate and mortality rate according to findings obtained at the end of the experiment (P>0.05). However, the amount and proportion of fat in the abdomen is high in only low quality female chicks (P<0.05).
Suggestion: If the accuracy of the methods used to distinguish between high and low quality is supported by new studies to be carried out, machines based on high technology can be produced for hatcheries, to make the job practical and repeatable because it is difficult to determine of quality parameters with manpower, since it is change from person to person and because it is a time consuming job. Prestarter fed group showed higher FCR, and body weight gain particularly in 3rd and 4th weeks. however, this effect was not reflected in the weight of the slaughter. Therefore if the production model is considered to be short-term, it is determined with this study that prestarter feeding system can increase the carcass yield and profitability.
Acknowledgment: We are grateful to the Çukurova University Scientific Research Projects Unit for their financial support to this project (Proje No: FLY-2018-9946).
References
Meijerhof, R., 2009. Incubation principles: what does the embryo expect from us? In: Proceedings of the 20th Annual Australian Poultry Science Symposium; 2009 Feb 9–11; University of Sydney, Sydney, Australia, p. 106–111.