Effectiveness of an Enzyme Cocktail to Mitigate Negative Effects of a Nutrient Deficient Diet on Broiler Performance

G.S. Archer

Background and Objective: A study was conducted to evaluate the efficacy of utilizing an enzyme cocktail consisting of phytase, xylanase, amylase and protease in broilers. Materials and Methods: Day-of-hatch Ross 308 male broiler chicks were randomly allocated to one of three dietary treatments: Positive control (PC, nutrient adequate), Negative control (NC, PC diet reduced by ME, dig AA, Ca, aP and Na) or NC plus enzyme cocktail (phytase, xylanase, amylase and protease); NCEC. All birds were weighed on day 10, 21 and 35 to obtain performance parameters: Body weight (BW), feed consumption (FC) and feed conversion ratio (FCR). On d21, tibias were collected from 2 birds per pen, for the determination of ash content and breaking strength. Results: On d35, birds fed NCEC and PC had larger BW (p<0.05). Similarly, through day 35, the NCEC had lower (p<0.05) FCR than the NC however both were still higher (p<0.05) than the PC. Compared to the NC diets, birds fed NCEC or PC had improved tibia ash and breaking strength (p<0.05) on day 21. Conclusion: (Enzyme cocktail improved performance and bone mineralization of birds fed suboptimal ME diets)It can be concluded that the enzyme cocktail used in this current study can improve performance and bone mineralization of birds fed a diet that is formulated to be suboptimal in terms of ME, AA, Ca, aP and Na. Furthermore, the use of such an enzyme cocktail could enable the formulation of lower-cost diets and contributes to the profitability of the production of poultry products.

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