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Alternative material to replace wood shavings as broiler litter

Aiming to evaluate alternative materials to be used as broiler litter reutilization, six consecutive lots of 5,600 female broilers were allocated to 35 pens. The treatments consisted of seven types of litter materials: wood shavings, rice husk, ground corncob, chopped camerongrass, chopped soybean straw, chopped corn stalk and sawdust, each one with five replications. In the birds, it was evaluated the average body weight, feed consumption and in the litter, it was evaluated the contents of N, Ca, P and pH. The presence of salmoella, the eimeria oocists counting in the litter, and the gut birds lesions score at slaughter were also observed. The use of alternative materials evaluated as litter, per six concecutive lots, as a alternative for wood shavings did no prejudice the performance of broilers. These materials, by presenting mineral values higher than wood shavings, after discarding, could be used as culture fertilizers.

body weight; broiler litter reutilization; feed consumption


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