Traits related to the individual feed intake in group-housed broilers and rabbits, and the capacity of broilers to optimise their diet and nutrient intake related to feed efficiency - INRAE - Institut national de recherche pour l’agriculture, l’alimentation et l’environnement
Reports (Contract/Project Report) Year : 2019

Traits related to the individual feed intake in group-housed broilers and rabbits, and the capacity of broilers to optimise their diet and nutrient intake related to feed efficiency

Abstract

Feed cost is the main production cost in poultry and rabbits, and represents 50 to 70% of the total production cost. Consequently, feed efficiency is the most important selection criterion in these species. For meat-type producing animals, feed efficiency is defined as the ratio betweenweight gain to feed intake during a given period. Weight gain is relatively easy to obtain at the individual scale, although it is labour intensive. On the opposite, feed intake measurements in individual animals are more difficult to obtain. In chickens, to measure feed intake, birds are housed in individual cages and the feeder has to be weighed at regular intervals. This method has several drawbacks: - Animals are housed individually whereas they are usually reared in groups - Animals are housed in cages whereas they are usually reared on the floor - The measurement is available only for longer periods, usually one measurement per week or every two weeks. This provides a very limited indication of the changes in feed intake, considering that a broiler production cycle is lasting only 5 weeks. The objective of this deliverable is to use automatic feeding stations to obtain individual data of feed intake in group-housed animals, and that are reared in conditions as close as possible to production conditions (e.g., on the floor for chickens, in collective cages for rabbits). Moreover, these feeding stations allow for the continuous collection of data of feed intake and to establish the dynamics of feed intake within a day, and all along the production cycle. These new traits have been correlated to feed efficiency to propose new traits that can be used for both nutrition and genetics studies of feed efficiency in poultry and rabbits.
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Dates and versions

hal-04229979 , version 1 (05-10-2023)

Licence

Public Domain

Identifiers

  • HAL Id : hal-04229979 , version 1

Cite

Sandrine Mignon-Grasteau, Juan Pablo Sanchez, Alfons Jansman, Jaap J. van Milgen. Traits related to the individual feed intake in group-housed broilers and rabbits, and the capacity of broilers to optimise their diet and nutrient intake related to feed efficiency. Deliverable D2.3, INRAE; IRTA; Wageningen Universiteit en Research centrum (Wageningen, Nederland). 2019, 23 p. ⟨hal-04229979⟩
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