The Relative Abilities of Two Breeds of Chickens and Two Varieties of Turkeys to Metabolize Dietary Energy and Dietary Nitrogen

Abstract

DIFFERENCES in dietary requirements between breeds and strains of birds have been reviewed recently (Sibbald and Slinger, 1963a). It was suggested that differences in requirements may be due to a number of factors including genetic variations in the ability to digest and/or absorb nutrients. These workers presented evidence to show that the strain of White Leghorn chicks used, metabolized more energy per unit of feed than did the strain of White Rock chicks employed. While the nutritive requirements of chickens and turkeys differ widely, evidence has been presented (Slinger et al., 1962a, b) to suggest that metabolizable energy (M.E.) values derived with chicks have reasonably good application in estimating the M.E. content of turkey diets. Direct evidence on this point, however, is lacking. The present experiment was designed to determine the M.E. and metabolizable nitrogen (M.N.) contents of a high and a low energy diet using two breeds…