Manufacturers of distillers dried grains with solubles (DDGS) are changing practices to extract corn oil from DDGS in the process of ethanol production, explain A.C. Guney of the University of Georgia and co-authors there and with Huvepharma Inc. The resulting product is called low-oil DDGS (LO-DDGS) and may be included in broiler diets.

In a paper published in Poultry Science, they report that they used two LO-DDGS and one unextracted DDGS in a broiler performance trial to determine maximum levels of inclusion without detrimental effects.

Corn- and soybean meal-based mash diets were used with different DDGS samples included at 10 or 20 per cent. A total of 630 Cobb 500 male by-product chicks were randomly assigned to six replicate pens containing 15 chicks each and fed diets from 0 to 18 days of age.

There was a significant interaction between source and level on bodyweight on days 11 and 18 when 10 and 20 per cent of LO-DDGS was included compared with the control group.

There was also a significant effect of source and level interaction on bodyweight on day 18 (P<0.05).

Feed efficiency from days 0 to 18 was improved when 10 per cent LO-DDGS was used compared with 20 per cent inclusion.

Abdominal fat pad weights were higher when LO-DDGS samples were included at 10 or 20 per cent than with the control group. There was a significant effect of DDGS source and level on fat pad weights (P<0.05).

Producers may achieve an increase in performance when including 10 per cent LO-DDGS in broiler diets, concluded the Georgia-based group. Guney and co-authors added that up to 20 per cent inclusion levels may have no detrimental effects on performance parameters compared with a standard corn-soybean diet.

Reference

^{Guney A.C., M.Y. Shim, A.B. Batal, N.M. Dale and G.M. Pesti. 2013. Effect of feeding low-oil distillers dried grains with solubles on the performance of broilers. Poult. Sci. 92(8):2070-2076. doi: 10.3382/ps.2012-02699}

September 2013