Assessment of diet formulation strategies that improve crumble quality and poult performance1.

In previous research at West Virginia University, we found that a lignosulfonate pellet binder and 3% mixer-added fat (MAF) maintains feed quality while improving amino acid digestibility using a rooster model. The current study examined the effect of commercial turkey starter diets varying in amino acid density (AAD; normal or high) and manufacturing technique (MTECH; MTECH1 utilized 1% MAF + 0.5% sand and MTECH2 utilized 3% MAF + 0.5% binder) on commercial feed mill manufacture efficiency and d 10 to 40 poult performance. All diets were manufactured at a commercial feed mill and descriptive manufacture data was obtained demonstrating that MTECH2 maintained feed quality to that produced utilizing MTECH1. In addition, MTECH2 produced larger, more uniform crumbles. Diets were then randomly assigned to 1 of 16 pens containing 105 male 10-d-old Hybrid Convertor poults and fed until d 40 at a facility designed to mimic commercial grow-out. The highest average poult weights were achieved when poults were fed high-AAD diets manufactured utilizing MTECH2. This study demonstrates that MTECH2 has benefit in commercial turkey feed manufacture and feeding. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]