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Predicting How a Broiler is Growing, Daily
Article from Industria Avícola July 2019 Issue.
Going beyond feed conversion in broiler production means handling more data, but also using mathematical models as a tool to improve poultry Nutrition. by Benjamin Ruiz
Click Here to open the original article in Spanish or see our English translation below.
“The purpose is to minimize cost, but produce the bird you want,” says Frank Ivey.
Photo by Benjamín Ruiz
Our Translation of the Industria Avícola Article, July 2019, pages 28 to 30:
Predicting how a broiler is going to grow, daily
Going beyond feed conversion in broiler production means handling more data, but also using mathematical models as a tool to improve poultry nutrition.
By Benjamín Ruiz
Poultry nutrition evolves. From the growth models of the 1990’s – the well-known IGM – which Frank Ivey developed while at Novus International, knowledge has also evolved and now he uses a set of equations and math calculations, not prediction curves. This new tool uses step by step daily growth to predict how the animal’s going to grow. It’s a decision-making tool.
“When we started IGM, the nutritionist had no idea about shipping, carcass weight, and bird weights. They only knew the feed conversion that resulted from the house.” Things have now changed.
Less muscle, less white meat
“The purpose of using this tool is to minimize cost, but produce the bird you want,” says Frank Ivey of Feed2Gain LLC. Experience has shown him that sometimes, when you push on price, you can wound up with a bony bird, because “money is spent on energy and muscle development is not obtained”. You can actually get the weight; but not out of muscle development.
Even today, when using enzymes, if energy is releases and if no corrections are made for that, the bird will have less muscle and, in particular, less white meat. “White meat develops later and requires a fair amount of energy, but if you run short on protein to your energy levels, you wind up with a less muscular bird and most people want that meat”.
How does the math model work?
The program allows for comparisons and predictions of a given broiler flock. The simulation helps to describe, explain, understand and improve a system, predict future performance, compare scenarios and ultimately, communicate ideas.
The program starts out simply. “You tell it what your nutritional program and how much each bird eats, what do you think each bird eats, and then you choose which breeds you’re running, because that determines the growth curve that we fit, and the program goes through a step to calibrate the growth and that corrects the bird to your diet”.
Program calibration needs to get genetic strain, broiler sex, feed conversion, carcass weight, number of diets, diet cost and feed weight.
It is important to know that any change made to the diet based on the matrix can be tracked with the change in the bird. Otherwise, this program will only tell what a hypothetical bird would do, and the producer would never know what his/her birds are going to do.
Fran Ivey asks the producer what kind of bird he/she would like to have. “You can try all kinds of diets, different changes or we can run through an optimization that asks you what your target is – live weight, carcass weight, feeds conversion – and then it will tell you the least expensive way to use your ingredients to reach your goal”.
Minimums and maximums of energy, proteins, amino acids or anything else are input. “People put limits on that, with what they need to feel comfortable. I encourage them to think about what’s happening to the carcass or other things, and what changes would they be happy making”.
Surface graphics help predicting which way to go and what decision should be made at that particular time.
Feed formulation and feed intake
The program includes a linear least-cost feed formulation. In this way, the user knows what the cost will be at all the different levels of energy, protein, amino acids and other nutrients. That is, the way it works as bird grows. “It even has a temperature sensitivity built in, because once it gets warm, the birds won’t eat as much”.
Feed intake is the key to a successful program model for growth. “That was the most difficult thing to get right – how does the bird decide what to eat and how much”.
Once the nutrients – on a day to day basis – give the right estimate of intake and growth, the rest is just working out the math.
The objective of the company
Generally, the nutritionist is the one using this type of tools. However, it can cause a lot of discussions with the marketing people on breast weights, on how to feed for better feed conversion and other smaller carcass cuts.
The poultry company needs to have an objective. Knowing the different markets for the different sized birds is, as well, something for the nutritionist to understand.
However, there can be a shift in target weights, which is a challenge for most companies. So, this tool makes estimations that makes things more certain for the nutritionist.
“Sometimes the nutritionist knows he/she has to increase energy, but they do not know how much so as not to affect cost, “says Dr. Ivey. In this way, the program makes suggestions. “I like to think of it as a candle in a dark room of what nutritional changes do I need to make to save money for my company”. Predicting what the changes are going to be – so there are no surprises – is really the key of what this tool does.
The challenge is that we’re saving money, not making money, so sometimes it’s not recognized. When suggestions are made to change the diet enough to hold the feed conversion the same and have all the feeds be less expensive, there is no question that the company saves money. But nutritionist can be blamed for not reducing feed conversion.
Modeling is central
This type of tool has a model and that’s a central piece of it. “It is the model for how the bird will respond to the nutrients it’s receiving. It’s not as a complete a model as one might someday have. It’s doesn’t include salts, minerals. It focuses on energy, protein and amino acids”. Generally, these nutrients are the key expenses in formulation.
Towards the future
In the future, “I think it will be an essential piece of everybody’s business”. Nowadays, a lot of information that is collected in the processing plants, feed mills, hatcheries and farms is being used, analyzed and interpreted.
There are many companies that collect data and help people to understand what their costs are. “But nobody does project what will happen as we change nutrition. So now our marketing needs are X, our nutritional expenses are Y, what’s the best outcome to meet that together? So that’s where I think this goes.”
Use of enzymes
If added to the feed formulation, Feed conversion should not be changed. However, there are times when it’s more cost effective to feed more feed but lower energy, and then there is the extra step of what happens when an enzyme is added, which it’s a difficult one.
Enzymes should be included based on the ingredients that are being fed. After the least cost formulation, the enzyme can be added on top and the program works out how much energy should be gained, how much protein and lysine are going to be included, depending on what the enzyme manufacturer declares.