Nutritional impacts of using graded levels of dietary linoleic acid on egg production, egg quality, and yolk fatty acid profile of laying ducks

Abstract

There is an increased interest among poultry nutritionists to increase the linoleic acid (LA) content of the egg, which possesses many benefits for human health. This fatty acid must be provided by the diet as the bird’s body cannot synthesise it. The present study evaluated the influence of different levels of dietary LA on the productive performance, egg quality and yolk lipid profile of Longyan laying ducks. In total, 900 Longyan female laying ducks aged 24 weeks were assigned to six dietary treatments, each containing 6 replicates of 25 ducks. The six dietary treatments contained six incremental levels of LA (analysed content: 0.36, 0.66, 0.80, 1.07, 1.28, and 1.45%) and the experimental diets were offered for the following 20 weeks. The results showed that different supplemental levels of dietary LA had no effects on egg production traits, concentrations of plasma cholesterol and triglycerides, or low or high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (p >.05). There was a linear increase in yolk colour (p