JWSS - Journal of Water and Soil Science

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This experiment was conducted to study the effects of using cotton-seed meal on the performance and carcass yield of broiler chickens at different ages. The experiment was performed in a completely randomized design with four treatments and five replicates for each treatment. The experimental treatments included the levels of 0, 3.5, 7, and 10.5% of cotton-seed meal in diets fed to chickens at 7-21 days of age. Except for the control group, these levels for grower (21-42 d of age) was increased to 7, 14, and 21% and for finisher (42-56 d of age) to 14, 21, and 21%, respectively. For the purposes of this study, 260 day-old chicks were reared in litter until 7 days of age. On day 7, chicks were divided into 20 pens with 13 chicks in each pen. NRC (1994) recommendation was used in balancing experimental diets. The chickens were weighed weekly throughout the experimental period (7-56 d). The main observations were body gain, feed intake and feed conversion ratio. Physical analysis of carcass was done at the end of the experimental period and percentages of carcass, abdominal fat, liver, pancreas and digestive tract to live body weight were calculated. The use of cotton-seed meal and the increase of the levels through different ages had no significant effects on body weight, daily gain, feed intake, feed conversion ratio, and carcass components. Increasing the level of cotton-seed meal in the diet at 7-21 days of age had significant effects on feed intake (P<0.05) and increased it. The results of this experiment indicate that we can use cotton-seed meal at levels of 7,14, and 21% of diets, respectively, in starter, grower and finisher stages without having any adverse effects on the performance and carcass yield of broiler chickens.

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This study was conducted to evaluate the effects of different levels of energy and protein on the performance of male broiler breeder chicks. Three hundred and sixty day-old Arian male broiler breeder chicks were used in a 2×3 factorial experiment with two levels of metabolizable energy (3050 and 3200 Kcal/Kg) and three levels of protein and sulfur amino acids (110% NRC, NRC and 90% NRC) in a completely randomized design with four replicates per treatment. Results obtained from the whole of the experiment’s period (0-49 days of age) indicated that level of dietary energy had a significant effect on body weight and daily gain (P<0.05). Increasing of the energy levels from 3050 to 3200 kcal/kg increased body weight (2216g vs 2314g) and daily gain (45.2 vs. 47.2 g per day). Dietary energy level had no effect on feed intake, feed conversion and carcass components. Increasing of dietary protein significantly increased body weight and daily gain and decreased feed conversion and percentage of abdominal fat pad (P<0.05). The results of this study indicated that we can fed Arian male broiler breeder chicks by using diets containing 3200 Kcal ME/kg and protein and sulfur amino acid levels according to NRC recommendation or 10% higher during 0-21, 21-42 and 42-49 days of age and achieve suitable growth rate and body weight.

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This study was conducted to determine chemical composition and evaluated apparent metabolisable energy (AME) and true metabolisable energy (TME) values of five Iranian barley cultivars. Basal diet contained corn soybean and in each of the test diets barley was substituted for 30% of corn and soybean fractions. The study was carried out in 3 experiments. In experiment 1, metabolisable energy (ME) values were measured by both total collection and markers (chromic oxide) in excreta of 35-d-old chicks. In experiment 2, ME values of the barley cultivars were determined by ileal digesta procedure. In experiment 3, 36 48-d-old broiler chicks (used in experiment 1 and 2) were used to determine TME and the nitrogen corrected TME (TME_n) of the barley cultivars. Highly significant differences (P<0.05) between bioassay methods were observed on average barley ME values. The average barley AME_n value measured by ileal digesta method was significantly (P<0.05) higher than excreta (total collection and markers in excreta) (2716 Vs. 2318 and 2124 kcal/kg, respectively). Barley ME values were influenced by cultivar (P<0.05) and the hullless cultivar showed greater AME value than the hulled cultivars (2695 vs. 2407.5 kcal/kg AME 2630 vs. 2324.7 kcal/kg AME_n). Cultivar had no significant effect on barley TME value. It was concluded that there is high variation between energy contents of Iranian barley cultivars. In addition, ileal digesta was found not to be an accurate bioassay for determination of barley AME value in broiler chicks.

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This experiment was conducted to evaluate the effects of 7 experimental diets (2 diets containing 100 and 200 mg vitamin E (VE)/kg and 5 diets containing 0, 0.5, 1, 1.5 and 2% green tea powder (GTP) ) on performance and breast and thigh meat oxidative stability of broiler chicks during different storage times. A total of 364 male broiler chicks were divided to 28 groups of 13 chicks each. Then every 4 groups were randomly allocated to one of experimental diets. During the experimental period (7-42 days of age) feed intake, weight gain and feed conversion of the experimental groups were measured. On day 42, 2 birds from each replicate (8 chicks per treatment) were weighed, slaughtered and their muscles of breast and thigh were minced and stored at 4ºC. Meat oxidative stability of the samples was determined on days 0, 6 and 9 of storage time using thiobarbituric acid test (TBA test). The results showed that addition of the VE and GTP to diets tended to significantly (P<0.05) reduce live body weight, weight gain, feed intake and abdominal fat accumulation and increase feed conversion ratio and pancreas size compared to control group. Increasing storage time from 0 to 6 and 9 d significantly (P< 0.05) increased TBA number. Lipid peroxidation and TBA values in thigh muscle were significantly (P<0.05) higher than breast muscle (1.46 vs. 0.359 mg Malonaldehyde/kg meat). Different dietary levels of GTP in diets did not have any significant effect on prevention of meat lipid peroxidation. In addition, the values of TBA in meat of the groups fed diets containing high levels of GTP significantly (P<0.05) increased in comparison to control group and those fed VE supplemented diets.