High inclusion levels of canola meal in broiler chicken nutrition

Abstract

Canola meal (CM) is a less expensive protein ingredient than soybean meal (SBM) for livestock feed formulation. Canola processing has a major impact on the nutritional quality of the meal, limitations in the dietary inclusions are associated with reduced meal quality because of overheating during processing. Crude protein (CP) and amino acid (AA) digestibility are affected by differences in processing methods and conditions causing a variation in the chemical and nutritive value of the meal. As a result, protein quality of CM can be verified using standardized ileal digestibility (SID) of AA in young broiler chickens to ascertain values that are reliable for efficient feed formulation when considering high inclusion levels of CM in poultry diet. Two separate experiments were conducted to measure SID of AA of CM sourced from 14 crushing plants across Canada, as well as to determine the effect of varying inclusion levels of CM on growth performance and nutrient digestibility of young broiler chickens. There were significant variations in SID of Lys (86.3 vs. 74.2%), Trp (94.5 vs. 76.7%) and Thr (87.3 vs.71.6%) of CM for broiler chickens. Whereas, Met (91.8 vs. 87.4%) and Cys (81.8 vs. 73.7%) were not significantly affected but Arg, which is known as a conditionally essential AA, varied significantly (92.0 vs. 83.8%). Lysine (1.97 vs. 1.53%), Thr (1.64 vs. 1.24%) and Met (0.68 vs. 0.46%) as well as other AA varied significantly in their standardized ileal digestible contents, while a regression analysis showed a significant relationship among AA suspected to be heat sensitive. In the growth performance experiment, overall result revealed that neutral detergent fiber (NDF) content of diet differed substantially with increased levels of CM but bird performance was not significantly affected. Energy utilization varied with age of birds while NDF digestibility was not affected by incremental levels of CM inclusion.