NEW NATURAL CUBAN ZEOLITE DEPOSITS FOR BROILER FEEDING

Three experiments were carried out to evaluate different natural zeoli te deposits: San Andre's (SA), Chorrillo (Ch) and La Pita (LP), maize diets (I) or wheat (II) and different technological samples from the C arolina deposits (C-1 and C-2 in experiment (III). The same system was used in each of them and 30 fattening chicks of the E-24 hybrid per r eplication and 7 replications per treatment were employed. 5% of the c ereal was substituted by zeolite in the diet of chicks from 7 days of age onwards and no re-balancing of the diet formulation was made. The control treatment with no zeolite (A) together with a treatment with z eolite from a Tasajeras deposit (R) were used as references. Feed conv ersion was improved (P < 0.10) in the maize diet (I) with all the zeol ite sources used, except that from LP while with wheat diets (II) conv ersions were always better with zeolite (P < 0.01). There are differen ces between technological samples (treatment III) from the same deposi ts, although they were better than the control and similar to R It is concluded that the utilization of any of the zeolite deposits evaluate d with maize or wheat diets except that from LP deposit is feasible, a lthough this latter deposit requires further study to explain the vari ation in the response according to the type of cereal. Furthermore, th ere is evidence of differences in productive performance provoked by t he type of zeolite used, the level of extraction and processing among other technological factors that might affect the repeatability or not of the results.