Abstract
Organic acids have stood out as alternatives to antibiotic growth promoters, especially those extracted from plants, such as anacardic acid, which is present in cashew nut shell liquid (CNSL). This study evaluates the effects of CNSL as a source of anacardic acid in diets of laying hens on performance, egg quality, lipid stability of yolk and microbiological analysis of excreta. A total of 216 commercial Hisex White laying hens were housed in cages and distributed in a completely randomized design with six treatments and six replicates of six birds per treatment. Treatments consisted of a diet without antibiotic growth promoter (AGP); diet with AGP (Halquinol 60% at 0.1 g/kg and Enramycin 8% at 0.1 g/kg); and four diets without AGP and with the inclusion of 2.5, 5.0, 7.5 and 10.0 g/kg CNSL. No effects of dietary addition of AGP and CNSL were observed in bird performance and external quality of eggs. A quadratic effect was observed for lipid oxidation in egg yolk, the minimum value of which was found at 5.8 g/kg CNSL. There were no significant effects of treatments on total mesophilic, total coliform and thermotolerant coliform counts on excreta. In conclusion, adding up to 10.0 g/kg of CNSL as source of anacardic acid in laying hen diet did not influence performance or egg quality, but the addition from 7.5 g/kg of CNSL upwards reduced lipid oxidation and improved the yolk colour.Keywords: Anacardium occidentale, lipid oxidation, natural antioxidant, organic acid
Highlights
For many years antibiotic additives have been the main form of controlling bacterial diseases on poultry farms
No significant differences were observed among the treatments for any of the performance variables, which indicates that the inclusion of Cashew nut shell liquid (CNSL) in the diet did not improve or compromise the performance of the laying hens, and neither did the addition of antibiotic growth promoter (Table 2)
No significant effect of treatments was observed on the percentages of albumen, yolk, and shell, specific gravity, Haugh unit and shell thickness (Table 3)
Summary
For many years antibiotic additives have been the main form of controlling bacterial diseases on poultry farms. In view of the removal of antibiotics from poultry diets in various parts of the world, interest in researching alternatives to maintain the performance of birds and control the growth of harmful enteric bacteria has increased In this context, organic acids stood out as possible alternatives to antibiotics, especially those extracted from plants, such as anacardic acid, which is present in cashew nut shell liquid. Himejima & Kubo (1991) and Muniz et al (2006) demonstrated that anacardic acids have a beneficial effect against microorganisms, including gram-positive and gram-negative bacteria, yeasts and fungi Addressing their antioxidant activity, Toyomizu et al (2000) stated that anacardic acids are associated with the prevention of oxidative damage to liver mitochondria in rats. The presence of the phytyl side-chain anacardic acid provides the potential to inhibit the generation of superoxide anion
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