Studies on the Biotin Requirement of Broilers Fed Sunflower Seed Meal Based Diets

摘要

A total of 560 day-old commercial broiler chicks were used in two experiments conducted toud'investigate the biotin requirement of broilers fed sunflower seed meal (SSM) based diets. Two basaludbiotin-deficient diets based on dehulled (Experiment 1) and non-dehulled (Experiment 2) SSM wereudeach supplemented with graded levels of biotin so that the rations had 40, 80, 120, 160, 200, 240 andud280 mcg/kg feed. Therefore a total of 14 treatments were tested. Each treatment was given toudduplicate floor pens with 20 chicks eaoh for a period of 28 days.udEstimation of the live weights, live weight gain, feed intake, blood glucose and free fatty acidudconcentrations, lipid contents and weights of liver and leidney, and liver pyruvate carboxylase activityudand the records of incidence of dermal lesions, fatty liver and kidney syndrome (FLKS) mortality andudleg deformities indicated that in the case of dehulled SSM, dietary biotin of of 160 mcg/kg feed waS'"udmarginal while at least 200 mcglkg appeared to be needed for optimum performance of the birds.udWhen non-dehulled SSM was incorporated in the diet, 200 mcg biotin1k:g feed was found to be theudlowest dietary level needed. However, as it seems that better "results could be obtained with higherudlevels, 240 mcg biotin1k:g with non-dehulled SSM is being recommended.