Utilization of decorticated, low gossypol cotton seed meal in WL layer diets

Increased protein ingredient (soybean meal) cost made the poultry farmers to seek for an alternative protein source. Hence to test the viability of decorticated and low gossypol cotton seed meal (CSM) in layer production this study was carried out. Three different trials (76x12x4; 32x6x3 and 88x10x6) were conducted by incorporation of CSM at various levels (0, 10, 15, 20; 0, 15, 20 and 0, 20, 40, 60, 80, 100) at various phases of production in practical layer diets. Experiment 1, 2 and 3 were conducted during 65–76, 48–60 and 1934 weeks of age, respectively. Egg production (EP), feed intake (FI), egg mass (EM), feed efficiency (FI/EM), egg weight (EW), body weight (BW) and egg shell defects (ESD) were recorded at every 28 d period. EP, FI, FE and ESD were not influenced by the feeding the CSM up to the maximum levels tested up to 20% (expt 1 and 2) or up to 80% of SBM replacement (24.04% CSM in exp 3) in layer diet. The EW, EM and BW increased with increase CSM levels in diet. The results of this study indicated that decorticated CSM can be incorporated up to 20% while decorticated and low gossypol CSM up to 24% in diet without affecting the egg production, feed efficiency and body weight in WL layers.