Role of guanidinoacetic acid in optimizing growth performance and feed efficiency of broilers fed animal protein based diets

Abstract

The present study was conducted to evaluate the influence of dietary guanidinoacetic acid (GAA) supplementation at 600 g/tonne on growth performance and return over feed cost in commercial broilers fed animal-based protein diets. A total of 96 day-old Vencobb 430Y broiler chicks were randomly distributed into three dietary treatments with four replicates of eight birds each. The experimental treatments consisted of control T1 (Corn-Soya MBM diet), T2 (Corn-Soya MBM diet + GAA) and T3 (Corn-Soya MBM diet with reduced ME by 50 kcal/kg + GAA). All diets were formulated as per BIS (2024) nutritional specifications for starter (1-10 days), grower (11-21 days), and finisher (22-42 days) phases. In experimental period of 42 days, feed intake was not significantly influenced by GAA supplementation across dietary treatments. Final body weight, body weight gain and feed conversion ratio also found statistically non-significant (p>0.05) but numerical improvements were observed, GAA supplementation in MBM-based diet with normal energy level enhanced body weight and body weight gain while reduced metabolizable energy group with GAA provided the highest return over feed cost, making it a practical nutritional intervention for commercial broiler production.