Estimate of choline nutritional requirements for chicks from 1 to 21 days of age

Abstract

Choline is an essential nutrient in poultry diets because it performs various important metabolic functions. The objective of this study was to re-evaluate the choline requirements of male broiler chickens from 1 to 21 days of age at two levels of methionine. Two assays using 2,160 Cobb chickens (1,080 in each assay) were conducted. The study design was completely randomized and consisted of six treatments and six replicates, with 30 animals per experimental unit. The semipurified basal diet was formulated with corn, soya bean meal, soya protein concentrate, starch and sugar, providing 390 mg/kg choline and 0.593% digestible methionine (requirement level) in Assay 1 and a reduction of about one-quarter in the requirement level of digestible methionine (0.440%) in Assay 2. Choline chloride (62.5%) was added by a supplementation technique to both basal diets to compose crescent levels of choline supplementation (715, 1,040, 1,365, 1,690 and 2,015 mg/kg). The weight gain responses were fitted using quadratic polynomial (QP) and broken-line (BL) models. The ideal intake of choline (mg/bird.day) was estimated from the first intercept of the QP with the BL plateau (BL + QP). The results showed that the diet with the 25% reduction in digestible methionine limited the maximum weight gain by approximately 10%. The choline requirements of broilers from 1 to 7, 1 to 14 and 1 to 21 days of age were 27,013, 44,458 and 62,535 mg/bird.day, respectively, for the requirement level of digestible methionine and 26,796, 41,820 and 56,578 mg/bird.day for the broilers receiving the diet with the 25% reduction in digestible methionine.

Impacts of Increasing Additions of Choline Chloride on Growth Performance and Carcass Characteristics of Broiler Chickens Reared to 66 Days of Age

“…When Met was fed at adequate concentrations, additional dietary choline increased feed intake without altering the feed conversion ratio (FCR) [ 13 ] but was also observed to reduce feed intake and improve FCR [ 14 ]. De Lima et al [ 15 ] demonstrated that dietary choline below the recommended level dramatically reduces feed intake and gain. They determined the dietary choline requirement for broilers grown to 21 days to be 1046 mg/kg, and above this concentration, improvements in gain appear to diminish [ 15 ].…”

“…De Lima et al [ 15 ] demonstrated that dietary choline below the recommended level dramatically reduces feed intake and gain. They determined the dietary choline requirement for broilers grown to 21 days to be 1046 mg/kg, and above this concentration, improvements in gain appear to diminish [ 15 ]. Gregg et al observed no alterations in the growth performance or carcass traits of straight-run broilers with increasing dietary choline when reared to 32 days in the absence of heat and nutrient stress [ 16 ].…”

Effects of dietary choline on liver lipid composition, liver histology and plasma biochemistry of juvenile yellowtail kingfish (Seriola lalandi)

“…Choline (2-hydroxy-N,N,N-trimethylethanaminium) is a watersoluble 'vitamin-like' nutrient essential to many animals, including fish (1)(2)(3)(4)(5) . Although choline is naturally present in various raw materials, it is typically supplemented into aquafeed to optimise fish growth (6,7) .…”

Effects of herbal choline as a replacement for choline chloride on myopathy, locomotor system, and hepatic health of broilers

“…Choline, an essential nutrient for broilers, is not adequately produced endogenously during the early weeks of life (Saeed et al, 2017;de Lima et al, 2018). It plays crucial roles in lipid transport in the liver, methyl group donation, acetylcholine neurotransmitter production, hepatic lipid transport, and bone cartilage maturation (Zhang et al, 2013;Calderano et al, 2015;Igwe et al, 2015).…”