With some farms now taking over 50,000 birds per house, it is difficult to source one unique flock which thus usually com- prises multiple breeding flocks of different ages. Inevitably, poor uniformity will be widespread, hence the need for tools to address unexpected issues.
Controlling variation There are some non-dietary measures available to control poor uniformity, e.g. ‘precise environmental control’ or ‘heavy culling’ to remove smaller chicks. However, it is virtually im- possible to control or improve uniformity without adopting specific dietary measures. Uniformity itself is a critical perfor- mance measure when optimising broiler diets and feeding regimes. Uniformity decreases with marginally protein-defi- cient feed. Birds may overconsume energy if feed is deficient in essential nutrients, such as amino acids, with variation in some who show only a small weight reduction compared with others exhibiting much poorer growth. The deficiency must be rectified early or uniformity remains poor and worsens with age. On paper, a formulation is carefully calculated based on each bird reaching its potential without issues. In reality, di- gestibility and subsequent availability of essential nutrients may differ within the flock. Evidence suggests that broiler performance depends on the inherent genotype of the flock population and, therefore, supporting optimum feed intake with highly digestible, good quality ingredients with
minimal anti-nutritive levels is the best approach. A recent trial looking at gut performance tested AlphaSoy Gold (ASG) as a means to improve uniformity in an uneven flock. Despite planning for individual chicks from a one-par- ent flock, the supplying hatchery failed and poor quality, une- ven chicks were delivered. At day 7, all groups showed poor uniformity while unexpected hot and humid weather up to day 21 did not help the situation either. However, with age, the AlphaSoy Gold diet markedly improved bodyweight uniformity (Table 1).
Net profit Chick condition and the weather compromised all perfor- mance, but for the rations containing ASG final day body- weight increased by 37 grams and overall FCR was reduced by 2 points. Based on broiler feed cost and the live weight value at the time (€ 1.20/kg), this improvement resulted in an increased net profit of € 36,000 per cycle (per million broilers), including the cost of ASG in starter 1 and 2 rations from day 0-21. In conclusion, the highly digestible product with con- sistent functional ingredients increased the digestibility of key amino acids by up to 2%. Anti-nutritive levels were re- duced and the protein digestion kinetics of soybean meal were considerably improved by reducing resistant protein and increasing rapidly-digestible protein. Adding this type of ingredient optimises feed intake in young birds and, therefore, will improve flock uniformity considerably.
▶ POULTRY WORLD | No. 2, 2021 19
Uniformity itself is a critical performance measure when optimising broiler diets or feeding regimes as uniformity decreases with marginally pro- tein-deficient feeds.
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