The effect of feeding various dietary lead level on the performances of broilers

The 42 day long trial was performed on 94 Hybro broilers divided into four groups. All groups of chickens were fed with commercial feed mixtures and t he lead was added as lead acetate of quantities enough to supply 0; 9.2; 92 .0 or 920.0 mg Pb/kg food. After 28 days, each group was divided into two S ubgroups. The first subgroup was continuously fed with diets containing lea d and the other subgroup with the control feed mixture without added lead. Increasing dietary lead intake level linearly decreased broiler performance s, even at 100 ppm. The lower performance caused by the dietary lead was le ssended by excluding the contaminated feed from the broilers diet, but only after a certain period which depended on the dietary level of lead, primar ily. Early detection of lead presence in feed and elimination of contaminat ed mixtures from the diet can reduce negative effects on performance to an acceptable level.