Performance, carcass yield, and qualitative characteristics of breast and leg muscles of broilers fed diets supplemented with vitamin E at different ages

• Autor(a) principal: Leonel,FR
• Data de Publicação: 2007
• Outros Autores: Oba,A, Pelicano,ERL, Zeola,NMBL, Boiago,MM, Scatolini,AM, Lima,TMA, Souza,PA, Souza,HBA
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Brazilian Journal of Poultry Science (Online)
• Texto Completo: http://old.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S1516-635X2007000200003
• topic: Broiler chickens; meat quality; vitamin E

The effects of vitamin E supplementation (300 mg/kg diet) in the diet of broiler chickens for different periods during rearing on the performance and qualitative traits of breast and leg muscles were evaluated. Seven hundred and twenty day-old chicks were distributed into six treatments: basal diet (25 mg vitamin E/kg diet), and diet supplemented with vitamin E from 1 to 15, 1 to 30, 1 to 45, 14 to 45 and 30 to 45 days of age. Vitamin E content, lipid percentage, TBARS (0 and 3 days of storage), color (*L, *a, *b), and pH were evaluated. There were no differences (p>0.05) among treatments in performance, carcass yield, and cut yields. Qualitative parameters (pH and color) presented no differences, although vitamin E positively affected TBARS values at 3 days of storage, mainly in leg muscles. Vitamin E levels in both muscles were higher in the birds supplemented throughout the experiment.