Effect of Diet on Efficiency of Egg Production

Abstract

IN MOST studies of the effect of diet on egg production, efficiency of production either has been ignored or has been calculated in terms of weight of eggs produced per unit weight of feed consumed without regard to changes in body weight or to maintenance requirement. Furthermore in most cases the diets studied have differed with respect to their ability to support live weight and egg production, and hence among the experimental lots there have been differences in maintenance requirement, in utilization of nutrients for gain in live weight, and in the proportion of total ingested nutrients utilized for egg production. Theoretically each of these differences would tend to invalidate the calculation of efficiency in terms of weight of eggs produced per unit weight of feed consumed. Although this calculation might yield results of practical value, and although it would probably be about as satisfactory as any method for revealing . . .