Abstract—Two experiments were conducted to investigate the effect of replacing corn with whole-grain paddy rice (WPR) in laying hen diets on egg production performance and quality. Commercial layers (Sonia) were used in both Experiment 1 and 2. In Experiment 1, 80 layers were placed into 4 groups of 20 birds each: the corn in the basal diet was replaced with 0, 10, 30 and 50%WPR. Each group of 20 birds had 10 replicates of 2 birds. In Experiment 2, 45 layers were placed into 3 groups of 15 birds each: the corn in the basal diet was replaced with 0, 70 and 100%WPR. Egg production was recorded daily and feed consumption was measured weekly throughout the experiments. Eggs from each group were collected biweekly to measure egg quality. Egg production performance and quality were not different among the groups (P>0.05), except for a decreased (P<0.05) shell ratio in the 100%WPR group. Moreover, yolk color score decreased (P<0.05) with increasing levels of WPR (50%WPR or more). The present results reveal that WPR can replace up to 100% of corn in laying hen diets without harming egg production performance and quality.

Index Terms—egg production, egg quality, laying hens, whole-grain paddy rice

Cite: Janjira Sittiya, Koh-en Yamauchi, and Kenji Takata, "Effects of Replacing Corn with Whole-Grain Paddy Rice in Laying Hen Diets on Egg Production Performance," Journal of Advanced Agricultural Technologies, Vol. 1, No. 1, pp. 1-4, June 2014. Doi: 10.12720/joaat.1.1.1-4