Effects of supplementing laying hen diets with different proprietary vitamin-mineral premixes and housing systems on egg properties and shelf-life stability

Abstract

Egg quality and durability have been directly linked to the nutrition of laying hen thus, the effects of five different supplemental vitamin-mineral premixes (VmP) in the diets of laying hens housed in battery cage (BC) and deep litter (DL) on the egg properties and shelf life stability in 0, 7, 14, 21 and 28 days of egg storage (DOS) were investigated in this study. In a 4-week feeding trial, Bovans Nera Black laying hens (n=480) aged 71-week were allocated to five treatments in each housing system (HS) (BC and DL). Each treatment was replicated six times and a replicate comprised eight hens. The basal isocaloric and isonitrogenous diet was appropriately supplemented with 0.25% of any of the five proprietary VmP and the diets were offered with water ad libitum to respective experimental hens in both HS. The experiment was a 2x5x5 factorial arrangement in a completely randomized design (2 HS X 5VmP X 5DOS). Foaming capacity, foaming stability, viscosity, emulsion stability, least gelation concentration and shelf life stability of egg white and whole egg from both HS decreased significantly (P<0.05)in DOS while the thiobarbituric acid reactive substances (TBARS mg/MA/100g) increased in DOS. The TBARS of respective whole and egg white from hens fed VmP1 (0.048 and 0.051), 2 (0.049 and 0.054), 3(0.056 and 0.155), 4(0.156 and 0.156) and 5 (0.153 and 0.151) differed significantly (P<0.05). Interactions of HS X VmP, HS X DOS on all attributes of both whole and egg white, except specific gravity and emulsion capacity, were significantly different (P<0.05). Eggs deteriorated in DOS irrespective of dietary VmP or HS but much more for eggs from DL compared with BC.