Effects of organic and inorganic manganese on egg shell quality, bone strength and immune response in old laying hens Khoshbin M.R., Vakili R.*, Tahmasbi A.M.1 Department of Animal Science, Kashmar Branch Islamic Azad University, Kashmar, Iran 1Department of Animal Science, Ferdowsi University of Mashhad, Iran *Corresponding author: rezavakili2010@yahoo.com
Online Published on 28 November, 2022. Abstract Khoshbin, M.R., Vakili, R. and Tahmasbi, A.M. 2022. Effects of organic and inorganic manganese on egg shell quality, bone strength and immune response in old laying hens. Animal Nutrition and Feed Technology, 22: 481–488. A study was conducted to investigate the effects of manganese sulfate and manganese amino acid complex on layer performance, egg shell quality, tibia breaking strength, and immune response in layer birds. A total of 250 Hy-Line W-36 laying hens (80 wk age) were allocated to 5 treatments groups and 5 replications with 25 pens/treatment and 10 hen/cage using a completely randomized design. There were 5 treatments with combination of supplemental Mn sulfate and chelated AA-Mn as follows: T1 0–0% (T1 as control), T2 100-0%, T3 75–25%, T4 50–50%, T5 25–75%. The feeding of dietary treatments started at 80 weeks of age and measurements of the key parameters were made from 82 to 92 weeks. The results revealed that supplementation of Mn-sulfate and AA-Mn had no significant (P>0.05) effect on the shell weight, thickness and breaking strength. Significantly (P<0.05) higher egg weight was recorded in the treatment groups (T2-T5) compared to T1. Tibia breaking strength was similar for all groups (P>0.05). However, the amount of force required to break tibia was numerically more in T4 group compared to T5 and T1 groups. Serum IgG and IgM levels were increased significantly (P<0.05) in T2, T4 and T5 groups as compared to T1 (control). It may be concluded that, supplementation of chelated manganese in laying hens’ showed improvements in egg weight and immune response when compared to inorganic salts at the latter part of the laying cycle. Top Keywords Egg shell, Immune response, Laying hen, Manganese, Tibia. Top |