Effect of feed selection and nutrient intake on the production performance of local and improved laying hens on small farms under scavenging conditions

Abstract

An on – farm experiment was conducted at Binh Yen Hamlet, Long Hoa Village, Cantho Province in the South of Vietnam. A total of 60 Tam Hoang (TH) and 60 Tau Vang (TV) layers were equally divided between 6 small farms (10 TH and 10 TV on each) and were followed for 20 weeks of the laying period. The hens were allocated at random to 2 treatments in a 2 * 2 factorial experiment. The first factor was breed (Tam Hoang and Tau Vang), and the second factor diet, including: Mixed diet including maize meal, fish meal and roasted soya bean meal and with a supplement of oyster meal and bone meal; Separate diet, including the same feedstuffs but supplied separately in 3 feeders, and with oyster and bone meal mixed together with the maize meal. There were thus 4 treatments with 6 replications (farms) and with 5 birds per experimental unit (pen) and in total 20 hens per farm. Daily dry matter (DM), crude protein (CP) and metabolisable energy (ME) intakes were 21 % higher for the improved Tam Hoang hens compared with the local Tau Vang hens. The hen–day production and mean egg weight were significantly different between breeds (P<0.001) and for the Tam Hoang were 30.1 % and 43.5 g respectively, compared with 23.9 % and 39.2 g, respectively, for the Tau Vang. However, there were no significant differences between treatments, and for the mixed and separate diets hen-day production and egg weights were 27.2 % and 41.4 g compared with 26.8 % and 41.4g, respectively. The feed consumption per kg eggs was not significantly different for both treatments and breeds. In addition, CP and ME/kg eggs were not significantly different between breeds, but were between treatments. CP and ME intakes were 602 and 633 g/kg eggs and 50.8 and 52.6 MJ/kg eggs for the Tam Hoang and Tau Vang hens, respectively (P>0.05). For the mixed and separate diets, CP and ME intakes were 681 and 553 g and 49.8 and 53.6 MJ / kg eggs, respectively (P<0.05). The hens from mixed and separate diet can get around 41 % and 44 %f the CP, 42 % and 35 % of the ME intakes (respectively) from the scavenging feed resource.

Keywords

Choice feeding; Egg production; Foraging

Published in

Livestock Research For Rural Development
2016, volume: 28, article number: 90
Publisher: Fundacion CIPAV

SLU Authors

• Ogle, Brian

  • Department of Applied Animal Science and Welfare, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    

UKÄ Subject classification

Animal and Dairy Science

Permanent link to this page (URI)

https://res.slu.se/id/publ/130362