An experiment was carried out using 120 unsexed chicks of a
commercial broiler breed taken from a hatchery nearby the farm of
the experiment. When the chicks started to hatch the chicks were
collected without the need to complete the operation of
hatching to
ensure that the hatching chicks were hatched at the same time.
The chicks were distributed into four groups of each group divid into 6
sub groups each sub group contains 5 chicks. The chicks were fed
different diets.
An experiment was carried out using 280 unsexed chicks of a
commercial broiler breed taken randomly from a hatchery after the
start of hatching. The chicks were distributed into four groups of 70
chicks each. The chicks were fed a certain type of
mash feeding for
7 days as follows:
The chicks of the 1st group were given the basal diet directly after
hatching containing 1.2% lysine, This diet is conformed to the
American feed tables of (NRC, 1994).
The 2nd and the 3rd group of chicks were given the diet directly
after hatching but containing 1.45%, 1.70% lysine respectively, and maintaining the rest of the nutrients as in the basal diet.
The chicks of 4th group were given the diet directly after hatching,
but containing 24% protein, and maintaining the rest of the
nutrients as in the basal diet.
After 7 days the chicks of four groups fed a broiler pellet
commercial diet until the age of 42 days.
The results showed the importance of adding lysine to the diet
directly after hatching on the average live weight at the end of the
first week, the differences were significant (P ≤ 0.05) between the
chicks of the third group compared to chicks of the first group. It
was also noted that the increase in lysine in the diet is better than
increasing the crude protein to 24% (P ≤ 0.01) on the average live
weight at the end of the first week. No significant differences were
noticed among the average live weight of the chicks of all groups at
the end of the experiment