• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• 제2권2호
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• pp.67-75
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• 1989

Studies were conducted to compare the utilization of dietary calcium between brown laying Tsaiya duck and Leghorn hen. Birds were fed corn-soybean diets containing 1.0, 2.0, 3.0, 4.0 and 5.0% calcium, respectively, with five birds per treatment. The metabolizability of calcium was determined by the indicator method. Experiments were conducted three times each at the age of 27, 31 and 36 weeks. Results appeared that duck eggs were heavier with better shell quality in comparison with hen eggs. Ducks fed 1% calcium diet resulted in severely depressed egg production (19%), but not for hens which still had 56% egg production. The metabolizability of calcium for hens was significantly higher than that for ducks (P<0.05) when both were fed diets containing 1 or 2% calcium. As the dietary calcium level was increased to 3 to 5%, there was no significant difference in calcium metabolizability between ducks and hens. When the dietary calcium was between 2 to 5%, the ducks retained more calcium than did the hens. Plasma calcium content for both hens and ducks fed 1% calcium diet was about the same. When the amount of the dietary calcium was increased to 2-5%, the plasma calcium level of ducks was approximately 7-10 mg/dl higher than that of hens. The calcium content in the egg shell of duck was significantly higher than that of hens, too. As the dietary calcium level was increased, there was a decreased magnesium content in the eggshell of hens, but not for ducks. The magnesium level in the eggshell was higher in hens than that in ducks. It is concluded that ducks could retain significantly more calcium and maintain higher plasma calcium level which might be the reason for larger eggs with better shell quality by ducks.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• 제12권7호
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• pp.1090-1095
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• 1999

In order to minimize the occurrence of fatty liver, this study investigated how adding a high level of dietary choline or methionine affected the lipid metabolism of Tsaiya ducks. Feeding trials were conducted with sixty Tsaiya ducks during their growing period, when they were 8-12 weeks old, and during their laying period, 10-14 weeks after the onset of laying when they were 26-30 weeks old. The ducks were randomly assigned to one of three groups: a control group (basal diet), a group in which methionine was added to the basal diet, and a group in which choline was added to the basal diet. The levels of methionine and choline added were twice as high as the levels recommended by the NRC for layer-type chickens. Experimental results indicated that adding choline to the basal diet of growing ducks significantly (p<0.05) increased their body weight, while adding methionine significantly (p<0.05)reduced their body weight. Adding either choline or methionine reduced the ducks' liver fat content in both the growing and the laying periods (p<0.05). Ducks receiving added methionine or choline in their diets displayed enhanced egg production (p<0.05). Adding choline increased serum triacylglycerol (TG) in the laying period (p<0.05). Adding either choline or methionine did not significantly (p>0.05) affect the t-globulin level. Adding methionine increased the activity of liver malic dehydrogenase in both the growing and the laying periods, and increased fatty acid synthetase in the laying period (p<0.05). While adding choline markedly (p>0.05) increased VLDL and apo B in both the growing and the laying periods, it decreased HDL and apo A in the laying period (p<0.05). This study found that adding a high level of choline to the basal diets of Tsaiya ducks in both the growing and the laying periods had beneficial effects. Furthermore, adding methionine affected the lipid metabolism of Tsaiya ducks to a lesser extent than adding choline.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• 제16권2호
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• pp.290-296
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• 2003

Tsaiya ducks and Leghorn hens are the two major laying birds raised in Taiwan. They are all excellent egg layers. Tsaiya ducks are small in body size (1.3 kg) with bigger egg weight (65 g) and stronger eggshell breaking strength than eggs from hens. The eggshell consists mainly of calcium carbonate, hence calcium plays an important role in the eggshell formation. Magnesium is also present in eggshell in small amounts, which may have effect on maintaining eggshell quality. In comparison studies, it was shown that the duck eggshells contained higher calcium and lower magnesium content than chicken eggshells. The eggshell magnesium content was not affected by the dietary magnesium levels (690-2380 ppm) in ducks, but in hens, it increased linearly with dietary magnesium levels. The palisade layer ($5000{\times}$) of the eggshell was found to have a compact form for ducks while there are many hallow vesicles in chicken eggshells. The eggshell magnesium deposition model is different for ducks and hens with ducks having a one-peak and hens having a two-peak model. The calcium deposition model is similar for both birds. Both the carbonic anhydrase specific activity and total activity in the shell gland mucosa of ducks are higher than those in hens. Ducks retain higher magnesium and lower calcium in the shell gland mucosa and secret less magnesium and more calcium into the shell gland lumen for eggshell deposition. The ATPase specific activity is maintained fairly constant during the eggshell forming stage, indicating continuous calcium transport into the shell gland lumen for eggshell formation. The magnesium content in duck eggshells is much lower than that in hens indicating that the magnesium content in the eggshell may have an effect on eggshell quality.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• 제19권7호
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• pp.1047-1053
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• 2006

The current study was designed to determine the effects of dietary docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) on fatty acid deposition in egg yolk and various tissues of laying Tsaiya ducks, and on the mRNA concentrations of hepatic lipogenesis-related transcription factors. Thirty laying ducks were randomly assigned to three treatments with diets based on corn-soybean meal (ME: 2803 kcal/kg; CP: 17.1%; Ca: 3.4%) supplemented with 0% (control diet), 0.5% or 2% algal DHA oil. The DHA content in egg yolks of the ducks was elevated significantly (p<0.01) with the supplementation of dietary DHA. The DHA percentage of the total fatty acids in the egg yolk of laying ducks was 0.5%, 1.3% and 3.4% for 0%, 0.5% and 2% algal DHA oil treatments, respectively, for the $1^{st}$ week, and 0.5%, 1.5% and 3.3% for the $2^{nd}$ week. Therefore, algal DHA oil can be utilized by laying Tsaiya ducks to enhance the egg-yolk DHA content. The concentrations of triacylglycerol (TG) and cholesterol in plasma of laying Tsaiya ducks were not affected by dietary DHA treatments (p>0.05). The DHA concentration in plasma, liver, and skeletal muscle was increased with the addition of dietary algal DHA oil (p<0.05). The mRNA abundance of sterol regulatory element binding protein 1 (SREBP1) and SREBP2 in the livers of laying Tsaiya ducks was not affected by dietary DHA, suggesting that the expression of these transcription factors is tightly controlled and not sensitive to DHA treatments.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• 제29권12호
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• pp.1742-1747
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• 2016

A $2{\times}5$ factorial experiment, using 2 dietary methionine levels (0.28% and 0.48%) and 5 dietary choline levels (0, 394, 823, 1,239, and 1,743 mg/kg), was conducted to study the effects of dietary methionine status on choline requirements of starter white Pekin ducks from 7 to 28 days of age. Four hundred eighty 7-d-old male White Pekin ducks were randomly allotted to ten dietary treatments, each containing 6 replicate pens with 8 birds per pen. At 28 d of age, weight gain, feed intake, and feed/gain were measured and the legs of all ducks from each pen were examined for incidence of perosis. Perosis and growth depression were observed in choline-deficient ducks and supplementation of choline reduced perosis and significantly increased weight gain and feed intake regardless of dietary methionine levels (p<0.05). In addition, significant positive effects of dietary methionine supplementation on weight gain, feed intake, and feed/gain were observed at any choline level (p<0.05). Supplementation of 1,743 mg/kg choline in diets alleviated the depression of weight gain and feed intake caused by methionine deficiency at 0.28% methionine level. The interaction between choline and methionine influenced weight gain and feed intake of ducks (p<0.05). At 0.28% methionine level, 1,743 mg/kg choline group caused 4.92% and 3.23% amount of improvement in weight gain and feed intake compared with 1,239 mg/kg choline group, respectively. According to the broken-line regression, the choline requirements of starter Pekin ducks for weight gain and feed intake were 1,472 and 1,424 mg/kg at 0.28% methionine level and 946 and 907 mg/kg at 0.48% methionine level, respectively. It suggested the choline recommendations of starter Pekin ducks on a semi-purified diet were 1448 mg/kg at 0.28% methionine level and 927 mg/kg at 0.48% methionine level, respectively. Compared with the adequate methionine level, menthionine deficiency markedly increased the choline requirements of ducks.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• 제6권3호
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• pp.331-337
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• 1993

In order to understand the effect of duck hepatitis B virus (DHBV) on the economic performance of ducks, Three groups (DHBV congenitally infected, experimentally infected and DHBV negative) Brown Tsaiya ducks (Anas platyrhyncha) were used for experimental animals. Artificial insemination and pedigree hatching were applied in the propagation of ducklings, and the efficiency of vertical transmission and experimental infection was analyzed through the detection of DHBV DNA in the sera of 8-week-old offspring. The observation of the records of the first year indicated that the persistent infection had no significant effects on the performance of ducks, except the egg number of survival ducks up to 40 week of age. Thus DHBV infection did not appear to give ill effects to the economic performance of ducks in first laying year. A higher infection rate (85.3%) was obtained in congenital transmission than that (75.5%) of experimental infection. Both modes of infection did not reach 100% infectious rate, although some ducks developed transient viraemia in a tracing of DHBV DNA for 24 weeks to 11 challenged ducklings.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• 제17권4호
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• pp.514-517
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• 2004

Expeller pressed and solvent extracted palm kernel cake (PKC) were force-fed to male and female Muscovy ducks at 7 weeks of age. The nutrient digestibility, apparent metabolizable energy (AME), true metabolizable energy (TME) and true available amino acid (TAAA) digestibilities were determined. There was no significant (p>0.05) effect of the type of PKC used on crude protein (CP), ether extract (EE), metabolizable energy (ME) and amino acid (AA) digestibilities. However, digestibilities of dry matter (DM) and neutral detergent fibre (NDF) was found to be higher in solvent extracted compared to expeller pressed PKC. The average digestibility of DM, CP, NDF and EE were 43, 58, 39 and 89%, espectively. It was found that the ducks utilized about 47% of the gross energy of PKC. The respective average AMEn and TMEn values of PKC for Muscovy ducks was 1,743 and 1,874 kcal/kg. The overall TAAA of PKC for Muscovy ducks was 65%. The data on the TMEn and digestible AA for PKC obtained from this study provide new information with regard to diet formulation for Muscovy ducks.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• 제27권11호
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• pp.1638-1643
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• 2014

This study was conducted to compare carcass characteristics and physico-chemical meat quality in two different genotype ducks raised under identical feeding and rearing conditions. A total of ninety 1-d-old Korean native ducks (KND, n = 45) and commercial meat-type ducks (Grimaud, n = 45) were fed same experimental diets during 56 d and 42 d, respectively to obtain similar slaughter weights. The experimental diet for starter period contained 20% crude protein (CP) and 2,900 kcal nitrogen corrected true metabolizable energy (TMEn)/kg of diet and that for grower period contained 17% CP and 3,050 TMEn/kg of diet. Average daily gain and feed efficiency of KND were inferior to those of commercial meat-type ducks (p<0.05). Carcass weight was not different between two genetically different ducks, but carcass yield of KND was significantly higher (p<0.05) than that of commercial meat-type ducks. There were no significant differences in cooking loss and pH of breast meat between two genetically different ducks, but water holding capacity of KND was significantly higher than that of commercial meat-type ducks. The linoleic acid and total polyunsaturated fatty acid of breast meat from KND were significantly higher (p<0.05) than the corresponding part from commercial meat-type ducks. Significant differences were detected in water holding capacity and the content of linoleic acid and polyunsaturated fatty acid, which were significantly higher in KND, whereas growth performance tended to be superior in commercial ducks. At the market weight, the meat from KND was judged to have better qualities with regard to higher water holding capacity and greater content of polyunsaturated fatty acid compare with meat from commercial meat-type duck.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• 제33권10호
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• pp.1624-1632
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• 2020

Objective: A total of three hundred unsexed ducks were utilized to estimate net energy requirements of maintenance (NE_m) and weight gain (NE_g) for 2 to 3-week-old Cherry Valley ducks and to establish a model equation to predict NE requirements using the factorial method. Methods: To determine the apparent metabolizable energy (AME) of the diet, fifty 7-day-old ducks at approximately equal body weights (BWs) were randomly assigned into five groups that were fed at different levels (ad libitum, 85%, 75%, 65%, and 55% of ad libitum intake), and the endogenous acid-insoluble ash as indigestible marker. The two hundred and fifty 7-day-old ducks were used for a comparative slaughter experiment. At the beginning of the experiment, ten ducks were sacrificed to determine the initial body composition and energy content. The remaining ducks were randomly assigned into five groups (same as metabolic experiment). Ducks of the ad libitum group were slaughtered at 14 and 21-day-old. At the end of the experiment, two ducks were selected from each replicate and slaughtered to determine the body composition and energy content. Results: The results of the metabolizable experiment showed AME values of 13.43 to 13.77 MJ/kg for ducks at different feed intakes. The results of the comparative slaughter experiment showed the NE_m value for 2 to 3-week-old Cherry Valley ducks was 549.54 kJ/kg of BW^0.75/d, and the NE_g value was 10.41 kJ/g. The deposition efficiency values of fat (K_f) and crude protein (K_p) were 0.96 and 0.60, respectively, and the values of efficiency of energy utilization (K_g) and maintenance efficiency (K_m) were 0.75 and 0.88, respectively. Conclusion: The equation for the prediction of NE requirements for 2 to 3-week-old Cherry Valley ducks was the following: NE = 549.54 BW^0.75+10.41 ΔW, where ΔW is the weight gain (g).

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• 제27권12호
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• pp.1744-1748
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• 2014

A dose-response experiment with seven supplemental pyridoxine levels (0, 0.66, 1.32, 1.98, 2.64, 3.30, and 3.96 mg/kg) was conducted to investigate the effects of pyridoxine on growth performance and plasma aminotransferases and homocysteine of White Pekin ducks and to estimate pyridoxine requirement for these birds. A total of 336 one-day-old male White Pekin ducks were divided to 7 experimental treatments and each treatment contained 8 replicate pens with 6 birds per pen. Ducks were reared in raised wire-floor pens from hatch to 28 d of age. At 28 d of age, the weight gain, feed intake, feed/gain, and the aspartate aminotransferase, alanine aminotransferase, and homocysteine in plasma of ducks from each pen were all measured. In our study, the pyridoxine deficiency of ducks was characterized by growth depression, decreasing plasma aspartate aminotransferase activity and increasing plasma homocysteine. The ducks fed vitamin $B_6$-deficient basal diets had the worst weight gain and feed/gain among all birds and this growth depression was alleviated (p<0.05) when pyridoxine was supplemented to basal diets. On the other hand, plasma aspartate aminotransferase and homocysteine may be the sensitive indicators for vitamin $B_6$ status of ducks. The ducks fed basal diets had much lower aspartate aminotransferase activity and higher homocysteine level in plasma compared with other birds fed pyridoxine-supplemented diets (p<0.05). According to quadratic regression, the supplemental pyridoxine requirements of Pekin ducks from hatch to 28 days of age was 2.44 mg/kg for feed/gain and 2.08 mg/kg for plasma aspartate aminotransferase and the corresponding total requirements of this vitamin for these two criteria were 4.37 and 4.01 mg/kg when the pyridoxine concentration of basal diets was included, respectively. All data suggested that pyridoxine deficiency could cause growth retardation in ducks and the deficiency of this vitamin could be indicated by decreasing plasma aspartate aminotransferase activity and increasing plasma homocysteine.