Abstract #T73

# T73
Gait score of broilers supplemented with vitamin D (25-OHD3).
Grace Alessandra Araujo Baldo*1, Ibiara Correia de Lima Almeida Paz1, Edivaldo Antônio Garcia1, Andréa Britto Molino1, Marlon Sávio Amadori2, 1School of Veterinary Medicine of Animal Science, UNESP, Botucatu, SP, Brazil, 2School of Agricultural Sciences, UFGD, Dourados, MS, Brazil.

The aim of this study was evaluated the gait score of broilers supplemented with vitamin D. For this, we used 2400 broilers distributed in a randomized blocks allocated in factorial design 2 × 2 × 2, being males and females, strains Cobb 500 and Ross 308, supplemented or not with vitamin D (25-OHD3). The diets were formulated following the requirements of each phase and added to 69 mg of 25-OHD3/t of feed in the supplemented treatments. After 41 d evaluated the gait score and, for this, 100% of the birds were put to walk in the path of a bounded linear meter inside the boxes. The way the birds walked was ranked scores ranging from 0 to 2, being gait score 0 bird that walked normally, gait score 1 bird which was difficult to walk and gait score 2 bird that walked with difficulty. We used the Chi-Square at a significance level of 5%. Females had higher (P < 0.05) frequency of gait score 0 (88.41%) and males had a higher frequency of gait score 1 (16.26%). The Cobb 500 strain of birds had higher (P < 0.05) incidence of gait score 0 (87.79%) when compared with the Ross 308 (83.10%). Supplementation with vitamin D (25-OHD3) did not affect (P > 0.05) the gait score of birds. Therefore, it was concluded that vitamin D (25-OHD3) did not improve the way of walking (gait score) of broilers.

Key Words: animal welfare, poultry production, way of walking