Understanding corn variability
Corn is the most common feed ingredient used in poultry nutrition worldwide. Consequently, it is the most common physical and biochemical factor affecting the bird’s intestines after drinking water.
Maize contributes with up to 65% of the metabolizable energy and 20% of crude protein in poultry diets.
Its average nutritional value is well known, but the variability in its energy value is a very common issue with a great impact on poultry performance and health.
Variability in corn composition (understanding what it implies)
In animal nutrition, yellow dent corn tends to be categorized by:
Test weight per bushel
Physical appearance
Crude protein content
Proximate analyses are used to
estimate its energy values
An alternative pathway is establishing a better understanding of the parameters affected for each factor, determine key indicators, measure them, and generate strategies in corn production and processing that minimize the variability.
We intend to contribute to spreading the understanding of corn variability.
This first article on this topic will address recent advances in understanding the:
Variability in corn composition
Physicochemical properties
Effects of thermal processing in corn
grinding
This information was partially presented at the Arkansas Nutrition Conference in September 2021.
However, the accuracy of estimating those energy values for feed formulation is not always satisfactory due to the:
Variability in nutrient and antinutrient
content
The grain’s physical properties
The interactions among these factors
Variability is part of nature, and there is an inevitable proportion impossible to control. For example, recently, Diego Melo Duran, in his Ph.D. dissertation from the Autonomous University of Barcelona in Spain, concluded that:
“The position of the kernel in the cob cause variation in the nutrient and non-starch polysaccharides (NSP) content of the grain.”
The content of all nutrients or their availability to generate energy could be variable in corn depending on:
This effect of position in the cob varies with genetic varieties. The genotype and the location of the plantation also interact, generating more variation in all nutrient composition.
However, NSP has great variability among maize genotypes.
In Dr. Melo Duran’s studies, the:
Total NSP ranged from 55.6-81.3 g/kg
Soluble NSP ranged from 1.0 to 8.5 g/kg
Total AX ranged from 38.8 to 50.0 g/kg
Soluble AX ranged from 2.2 to 5.3...
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