Effects of dry whey powder and calcium butyrate supplementation of corn/soybean-based diets on productive performance, duodenal histological integrity, and Campylobacter colonization in broilers

Table 2 Effect of experimental diet on productive performance of broilers

	Co	Bu	Wh	BuWh	SEM¹	p-value²
Starter period (0–21 days)
Body Weight (g)	635.6^b	544.2^c	627.7^b	681.3^a	10.8	***
Daily Weight Gain (g/d)	29.9^b	25.3^c	29.5^b	32.2^a	0.5	***
Daily Feed Intake (g/d)	46.8^a	41.3^b	46.3^a	49.1^a	0.9	***
Feed Conversion Ratio³	1.57^ab	1.64^a	1.57^ab	1.53^b	0.02	*
Survival (%)	97.3	98.0	99.3	100.0	1.2	NS
Grower-finisher period (22–42 days)
Daily Weight Gain (g/d)	99.1	99.5	102.4	100.5	1.4	NS
Daily Feed Intake (g/d)	160.6	154.4	162.8	159.2	2.2	NS
Feed Conversion Ratio³	1.62	1.55	1.59	1.58	0.02	NS
Survival (%)	93.3	94.7	97.3	96.7	2.3	NS
Overall production period (0–42 days)
Body Weight (g)	2716.0^ab	2633.1^b	2778.7^a	2791.9^a	34.0	*
Daily Weight Gain (g/d)	65.3^ab	63.3^b	66.8^a	67.2^a	0.8	*
Daily Feed Intake (g/d)	105.1^a	99.2^b	106.0^a	105.5^a	1.4	*
Feed Conversion Ratio³	1.61	1.57	1.59	1.57	0.01	NS
Survival (%)	90.7	92.7	96.7	96.7	2.5	NS
European Production Efficiency Factor⁴	364^c	370^bc	403^ab	409^a	8.4	**

Co, basal control diet with no supplementation; Bu, basal diet supplemented with 0.1% calcium butyrate; Wh, basal diet supplemented with 6% whey; BuWh, basal diet supplemented with 0.1% calcium butyrate and 6% whey
Each value represents the least square mean of five replicates (30 birds per replicate)
^a,b,cMeans in a row not sharing a common superscript are significantly different
¹Pooled standard error of mean
²Significance of the effect of Diet (NS: not significant; *: p < 0.05; **: p < 0.01; ***: p < 0.001)
³Feed Conversion Ratio: feed intake (g)/weight gain (g)
⁴European Production Efficiency Factor: ((Survival rate [%] x Body weight [kg])/(age [d] x Feed Conversion Ratio)) × 100

ISSN: 1746-6148