Multimillion-dollar project | $3.6 million initiative will examine how birds digest different feeds, including peas
A multimillion-dollar initiative examining poultry nutrition, management and welfare is expected to improve production and reduce costs for producers, says the University of Saskatchewan researcher leading the project.
One aspect of the five-year program will examine poultry digestion, as well as different kinds of feed, including peas.
“It’s primarily in response to the fact that feed prices have doubled in the last five to 10 years,” said Hank Classen of the University’s agriculture college.
“And in addition to doubling, they’re also much more erratic, depending on what’s happening with the world situation for corn and soybeans, as an example.”
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Funding of $3.6 million, which is provided through the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada and poultry industry organizations in Saskatchewan, will allow Classen to study how the rate of digestion influences production, animal health, the use of growth promotants and meat quality.
“Historically, we’ve always thought what we’re looking for is complete digestion and as quickly as possible, and now we’re starting to change that and say we at least need to understand whether that’s the correct dogma or not or whether we should be thinking about some of it being slowly digested and thereby changing the characteristics of the gut and changing how the nutrient is metabolized once it’s absorbed,” said Classen.
There may be a role for peas in the rations used by broiler breeders, said Clinton Monchuk, chief executive officer of Chicken Farmers of Saskatchewan.
“It’s something that is slowly metabolized in their gut and it keeps them satisfied longer, which is good,” he said. “In the broiler breeders, they have more of a restricted diet to promote hatching eggs, so this is obviously a beneficial thing from the initial research that (Classen has) done. This position will go even further into that to see if we can do it on a wider scale.”
Researchers will also examine variations of other low glycemic grains, which are digested more slowly.
“These slowly degraded proteins or starch will set up a fermentation process, and that fermentation process might be valuable or it might in fact be detrimental,” said Classen.
“We need to understand and be able to possibly incorporate that into a formulation package so we can formulate diets appropriately.”
Classen said updates on the project will be provided to stakeholders on a yearly basis.
“Some of it they will not be able to use right away,” he said.
“Other components, they will, I think, be able to incorporate in a relatively short term.”
