The experiment was conducted to determine the effect of dietary methionine + cystine (met + cys) requirement of 1-to-21-day-old broiler chicks on thermoneutral environment. Four hundred Avian Farm male broiler chicks were assigned to a randomized experimental design with five treatments (0.756, 0.810, 0.866, 0.920, and 0.976% of met + cys), eight replicates of ten birds. Weight gain (WG), feed:gain ratio, met + cys intake, protein deposition of absolute weights of liver, gizzard, and lung and relative weights of lung […]

Two experiments were conducted to determine the nutritional requirements of total methionine + cystine for Ross male broilers from 1 to 21 and 22 to 42 days old on tropical climate. The following parameters were evaluated: feed intake, weight gain, feed:gain ratio and absolute weights and yields of carcass, noble cuts (chest, thighs and drumsticks) and abdominal fat. The experiment was analyzed as a complete randomized design with six levels of methionine + cystine and four replicates of 12 animals, […]

It was evaluated the effect of two rest periods (RPs) on the canopy structural characteristics of paddocks of Mombaçagrass, a cultivar of Panicum maximum, under intermittent grazing; animal production was also evaluated. The RPs were defined by the time required for the expansion of 2.5 and 3.5 new leaves per tiller. Canopy traits response variables were: height, total green forage mass (TGFM), green leaf mass (GLM), culm mass (CM), leaf/stem ratio (L/S), and leaf area index (LAI). It was also […]

This study was conducted to evaluate the effects of lead spheres placed in the uterus to simulate pregnancy and of growth promoter on carcass weight, carcass conformation, carcass and leg lengths, beef round and fat thickness, percentages of bone, muscle, and fat, and thawing and cooking losses. Twenty Murrah buffalo heifers averaging 20 months of age were randomly assigned to one of three treatments: control (non-pregnant heifers but with ovarian activity – NP), lead (100 lead spheres placed in the […]

The objetive of this study was to evaluate the performance of broiler genotypes using repeated measurements. Four genotypes (A, B, C, and D) and two sexes were evaluated at six ages (7, 14, 21, 28, 35, and 42 days) for average feed intake (AFI), average body weight (ABW) and feed:gain ratio (F/G) using an unbalanced incomplete blocks 4×2 factorial design. Five error co(variance) structures were tested using the MIXED procedure of SAS® for statistical analyses. Averages were estimated by least […]

One experiment was carried out to determine the energy value of feeding fats (refined soybean oil, refined canola oil, refined sunflower oil, poultry fat, fish oil and lard) for broilers. One hundred and sixty eight broilers averaging 22 days old were allotted to a complete randomized design with seven treatments and four replicates of six broilers. The experiment lasted 8 days, with three days for adaptation and five days for excreta collection. The control replaced 20% of basal diet, as-fed […]

The objective of this work was to evaluate the inter treatment discrimination according to feed conversion efficiency in several animal performance experiments. The variables investigated were: feed conversion ratio (FCR = intake: production ratio), feed efficiency index (FEI = production: intake ratio) and bio-nutritional index (BNI). The BNI was constructed from the first canonical variable obtained based on the multivariate analysis of variance of the intake and animal production (weight gain or milk production) variables. The results indicated that FCR […]

Fifty crossbred primiparous sows averaging weight of 210.3 ± 22.5 kg were used to evaluate the total lysine levels (0.95, 1.03, 1.10, 1.18 and 1.25%) in the diet, during lactation (17.69±1.17 days). A randomized blocks design with five treatments and ten replicates the sow as the experimental unit was used. During the experimental period, the sows were daily fed 4.3 kg of diet. Lysine intake increased linearly, in response to the dietary lysine levels. The productive and reproductive parameters of […]

The objective of this trial was to characterize the byproduct of lysine production (BLP) and to evaluate performance and carcass traits of confined Santa Gertrudis young bulls receiving increasing dietary levels of BLP. The chemical composition of BLP was the following (dry matter basis): 38% dry matter and 85% crude protein with 79% of this total coming from nonprotein nitrogen; no toxic levels of heavy metals were detected. Twenty-seven young bulls averaging ten months of age and initial body weight […]

Weight records of 24.028 zebu animals from Guzerá, Nelore, and Polled Nelore breeds available from Brazilian Association of Zebu Breeders (ABCZ) database were used to estimate growth curve parameters. The measures were taken on animals which were born between 1960 and 2000, every three months, from birth to 24 months of age. Non-linear Brody, Gompertz, Logistic, Mitscherlich, von Bertalanffy, Richards, and Double Logistic models including sex, farm, year of birth, month of birth, raising system, and interaction sex*raising system as […]