Effects of graded levels of creatine and guanidino acetic acid in vegetable-based diets on performance and biochemical parameters in muscle tissue.

Abstract

Fish meal is still allowed as feed ingredient in broiler diets, however, recently its availability decreased while prices increased. When switching to pure vegetable diets, poultry producers often observe a reduction in performance which may partly be explained by a lack of creatine supply. Playing an important role in energy metabolism of animals, creatine is not found in plants. Supplemented creatine (as CreapureTM) or guanidino acetic acid (GAA, as CreAminoTM) which is the only natural precursor of creatine, may balance the animal’s demand for this semiessential nutrient. A trial with male broilers was conducted in order to investigate the potential of both supplements to resolve a performance reduction under vegetarian nutrition conditions. The arrangement comprised a negative control (vegetable-based), treatments with 0.04, 0.08 and 0.12% creatine, treatments with 0.031, 0.063, 0.094, and 0.126% supplemental GAA, and a positive control (50 (1-21 days) and 30 g/kg fish meal (22-42 days)). Overall weight gain and feed conversion in the positive control were superior to the negative control (p<0.05). Increasing levels of supplemented creatine and GAA improved performance until almost reaching the levels of the positive control. Muscle creatine content in breast meat was lower in the negative control compared to the positive control (p<0.05), but graded creatine and GAA supplementation increased the content to even higher levels than in the positive control (highest inclusion p<0.05). Results suggest that both supplemental creatine and GAA have the potential to counteract performance declines due to feeding pure vegetable diets. Data further suggest that GAA can be used as an efficient creatine source.