Effect of organic chromium supplementation on performance of white leghorn chicken recovering from Newcastle disease.

Abstract

Rajendran, D., Vasanthakumar, P., Selvaraju, G., Thomas, K.S., Premkumar, N. and Dineshkumar, D.2012. Effect of organic chromium supplementation on performance of white leghorn chicken recoveringfrom newcastle disease. Animal Nutrition and Feed Technology, 12: 247-255.An experiment was conducted for a period of 4 weeks to study the stress relieving effect ofchromium supplementation on production performance and egg quality traits in Newcastle disease (ND)affected laying hens. Total of 3000 birds (White Leghorn chicken, BV 300 strain) of 33 weeks weredivided into 6 groups (T1 to T6) having 10 replicates in each group and each replicate having 50 birds.The group: T1 was control, unaffected by Newcastle disease (ND), while all other groups (T2 to T6) wereaffected by ND and were recovering from the disease. T2 was not supplemented with chromium sourceand acted as negative control. T3, T4, T5 and T6 were supplemented with inorganic (chromium chloride),organochromium enriched yeast (OCEY), chromium yeast and chromium picolinate @ 200 ppb, respectively.The results revealed that weekly average egg production was maximum in laying hens of T5 followed byT6 and T4 groups during first week, T5 followed by T4 and T6 during second week while T4 followedby T5 and T6 during third and fourth week. Organic chromium supplementation (T4, T5 and T6) reducedthe mortality significantly (P<0.01) in birds. The reduction in the mortality (%) compared to untreatedT2 was about 58.06, 54.84 and 41.94% in laying hens of T4, T5 and T6 groups, respectively. Nosignificant difference was observed in feed intake and egg shell thickness among the treatment groups.The egg shell weight was significantly high in the healthy birds (T1) than other treatment groups exceptfor T4 group. Egg cholesterol levels were significantly (P< 0.05) reduced by supplementation of organicchromium. Increase in egg production in ND affected birds and decrease in egg yolk cholesterol by meansof inclusion of organic chromium, in particular chromium yeast, organochromium enriched yeast andchromium picolinate supplementation to layer feed could be useful measure for laying hens and it ensureseconomical benefit