Effects of maternal and dietary vitamin A on growth performance, meat quality, antioxidant status and immune function of offspring broilers

ABSTRACT The aim of this study was to evaluate the effects of maternal and dietary vitamin A (VA) level on growth performance, meat quality, antioxidant status and immune function of offspring broilers. Chinese yellow-feathered breeder hens were fed a basal diet supplemented with 0, 5,400, 10,800 and 21,600 IU/kg VA for 8 wk, with 6 replicates of 22 hens per replicate. Then the offspring hatched from each of the 4 maternal groups were fed a basal diet supplemented with 0 or 5,000 IU/kg VA for 63 days, Overall, there were 8 treatment combinations, each with 6 replicate pens of 20 birds. Results showed that: (1) providing VA in offspring diets increased final body weight (FW), average daily gain (ADG) and average daily feed intake (ADFI), but reduced feed-to-gain ratio (F/G) and mortality of offspring broilers (P 0.05). (2) Maternal feeding with 21,600 IU/kg VA increased (P