Rearing broilers as mixed or single-sex: relevance to performance, coefficient of variation, and flock uniformity

Title
Rearing broilers as mixed or single-sex: relevance to performance, coefficient of variation, and flock uniformity
Publication Date
2022-12
Author(s)
England, Ashley D
Gharib-Naseri, Kosar
( author )
OrcID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1740-7889
Email: kgharib2@une.edu.au
UNE Id une-id:kgharib2
Kheravii, Sarbast K
( author )
OrcID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8950-8841
Email: sqassim2@une.edu.au
UNE Id une-id:sqassim2
Wu, Shu-biao
( author )
OrcID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1790-6015
Email: swu3@une.edu.au
UNE Id une-id:swu3
Type of document
Journal Article
Language
en
Entity Type
Publication
Publisher
Elsevier BV
Place of publication
The Netherlands
DOI
10.1016/j.psj.2022.102176
UNE publication id
une:1959.11/58122
Abstract

With known variation in performance between male and female broilers and the fact that sourcing single-sex birds for use in research is becoming increasingly difficult, it becomes important to determine the effect of rearing method with male and female broilers on between-pen variation and body weight (BW ) uniformity. We evaluated the performance response of broilers reared as single or mixed-sex to standard and reduced crude protein (CP ) diets. The study was designed as a 2 £ 3 factorial arrangement of treatments consisting of 672 Cobb-500 broilers assigned to 48-floor pens with 6 treatments, 8 replicates, and 14 birds per pen. The factors were rearing method (male singlesex, female single-sex, or equally mixed-sex) and dietary CP level (standard or reduced). For the overall period of the trial (d 0−35) there was a significant effect (P < 0.001) of rearing method and CP level on feed intake (FI ) and feed conversion ratio (FCR ). There was also a significant interaction between rearing method and CP level for BWG during d 0 to 35 (P <0.01). There was a significant interaction between CP level and sex on d 34 BW (P <0.01) where the reduced CP diet decreased the BW of both males and females, but to a greater extent the BW of the female birds. Dietary CP level had a significant effect on relative breast and drumstick weights with birds fed the reduced CP diet having significantly lower breast weights (P <0.001) and higher drumstick weights (P <0.01).This study suggests that male and female broilers have different CP requirements, and rearing birds as equally mixed-sex results in the lowest CV% for performance parameters and best BW uniformity compared to single-sex birds. Furthermore, when low CP diets are fed to broilers, they will prioritize the growth of more important body parts such as the legs.

Link
Citation
Poultry Science, 101(12), p. 1-8
ISSN
1525-3171
0032-5791
Start page
1
End page
8
Rights
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International

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