Determining Tocotrienol Rich Fraction Effects on Laying, Mortality and Egg Quality Parameters

Abstract

The public interest and awareness in healthier lifestyle has increased the demand of functional food, nutraceuticals and designer foods, which has resulted in the creation of new foods in marketplace, for instance designer and specialty eggs. A feeding trial was carried out to evaluate the laying performance of H&N layer chickens fed diets supplemented with tocotrienol rich fraction (TRF), as well as to quantify tocopherol and tocotrienol accumulation in eggs and their effect on egg quality. A total of 300 H&N laying hens (17-wk old) were randomly allocated to 50 battery cages with 6 birds per cage. The birds were assigned equally to 6 different treatment diets; commercial diet (F1), corn-soy based diet (F2), corn-soy based diet added with 25ppm (F3), 50ppm (F4), 75ppm (F5) and 100ppm (F6) of tocotrienol rich fraction (TRF). Egg production and egg quality measurements were not significantly different (P>0.05) between treatments. Egg yolk from hens fed TRF supplemented diets contained more tocotrienol compared to those fed corn-soy based diet (P0.05). As feeding time progressed, the tocotrienol content tended to accumulate in the egg yolks (P<0.05).

Keywords

• laying hens
• tocotrienol
• egg production