Egg enrichment with n‐3 fatty acids in farmed hens in sub‐optimum temperature: A cold‐temperament additive mix alleviates adverse effects of stress on performance and health

Abstract

At some stage, laying hen farming is likely to be subjected to sub‐optimum temperatures (SOTem) due to climate change. While egg enrichment with n‐3 fatty acids is a common practice in the poultry industry, in SOTem it has been less investigated. This study tested the effects of egg enrichment through extruded flaxseed (FLX) (180 g/kg) alone or along with hulled‐soaked barley (H‐SB) (170 g/kg), namely FLBA, with and without a cold‐temperament additive mix (CTA) (25 g/kg: 5 g/kg flixweed (Descurainia sophia), 10 g/kg dried herb‐extraction residues from pussy willow (Salix aegyptiaca) and 10 g/kg dried lemon (Citrus limon) residue) in two temperatures (20°C and SOTem: 27°C) on egg performance, yolk fatty acids, lipid components, blood biochemistry, serological enzymes, antioxidant and immune system of Hy‐Line W‐36 53‐week‐old for 9 weeks. Two hundred seventy layers were randomly distributed to nine treatments, resulting in six replicates with five hens. Hens fed flaxseed diets, regardless of temperature or CTA, had higher levels of n‐3 fatty acids in yolks than others. Temperature negatively influenced feed intake and egg production. FLX + H27 and FLBA + H27 groups outperformed the other groups regarding cholesterol in yolk (10.1, 10.3 mg/g yolk), high‐density lipoprotein (HDL) (5.19, 4.93 mg/g yolk), total protein (FLX + H27: 6.82 mg/dl), HDL in the blood (FLBA + H27:83.8 mg/dl), superoxide dismutase (FLBA + H27:90.4 U/ml), glutathione reductase (FLBA + H27: 1042.1 U/ml), glutathione peroxidase (FLX + H27: 1149.7 U/ml) and catalase (FLBA + H27: 12.5 U/ml). Total antibody, immunoglobulin G and immunoglobulin M after 42 days were significantly higher in chicks fed CTA‐added diets (p < 0.05). Replacing corn and soya bean meal with H‐SB did not negatively change the above‐mentioned factors. Our findings collectively suggest that egg enrichment with n‐3 fatty acids through dietary FLBA + H27 (180 g/kg flaxseed, 170 g/kg H‐SB, and 25 g/kg CTA) in SOtem is suggested without any adverse impacts.

Does supplementing laying hen diets with a herb mixture mitigate the negative impacts of excessive inclusion of extruded flaxseed?

“…The experiment took place at a large commercial egg-producing farm (Morghineh Markazi Farm, Arak, Iran) [21]. For two weeks, all hens were fed the control feed (Table 1) to let them adjust to the experimental conditions, and then, 240 Hy-Line W-36 hens (50 weeks old) were assigned to the experimental pens at random.…”

“…The eight treatments were control, Flx9 (90 g/kg flaxseed), Flx18 (180 g/kg flaxseed), Flx27 (270 g/kg flaxseed), control+H (24 g/kg H), Flx9+H (90 g/kg flaxseed+ 24 g/kg H), Flx18+H (180 g/kg flaxseed+ 24 g/kg H), and Flx27+H (270 g/kg flaxseed+ 24 g/kg H). In this study, the extrusion process of flaxseed was carried out following a single screw extruder (Yemmak Extruder, Turkey), as detailed in our previous works [20,21]. The chickens were kept in 48 steel pens (each with five hens) with concrete flooring, and the photoperiod was adjusted in a 16:8 (light: dark) schedule.…”

Should we farm beluga ( Huso huso ) in fresh water or brackish water?—The case study on taurine requirement

“…For all analyses, the level of 5% was considered as the threshold for being a significant difference among treatments or trends. We used the spss software (version 21.0 for Windows) for analyzing all data (Hosseini et al, 2021; Slami et al, 2021).…”

Analysis of Acute Nitrite Exposure on Physiological Stress Response, Oxidative Stress, Gill Tissue Morphology and Immune Response of Large Yellow Croaker (Larimichthys crocea)

“…The normality of all data were checked using the Kolmogorov–Smirnov test. The isolated and interactive effects of exposure time and nitrite treatment were analyzed using a two-way ANOVA (listed in Table 1 ) according to the method of Hosseini et al [ 25 ]. If significant differences of interaction were found, Duncan’s multiple range tests were used to determine the differences between means.…”