In vitro and in vivo evaluation of protein quality of enzymatic treated feather meals

Feeding trials were designed to evaluate the nutritive value of feather meal treated by K6 and K82 keratinase. There were five treatments in feather meal preparation: CFM (non-enzymatically treated feather meal), K6FM (K6 keratinase treated feather meal), K82FM (K82 keratinase treated feather meal), K6:K82FM [K6 and K82 keratinase (5:1) treated feather meal] and CMFM (commercial enzyme treated feather meal). The pepsin digestibility of CFM (70 %) and CMFM (68 %) was significantly higher than K6FM (60 %), K82FM (61 %) and K6:K82FM (63 %). Total amino acid content of K82FM (89.65/100 g) was the highest compared with the other treatments. The nutrient digestibility of the feather meals was determined for broiler chicks between 21 and 27 days old. The apparent nitrogen retention of K82FM (85.82 %) and K6FM (77.31 %) was significantly higher than K6:K82FM (55.42 %), CMFM (45.70 %) and CFM (48.16 %). The apparent metabolisable energy (AME(n)) was not significantly different between the feather meal treatments, although K82FM, K6FM and K6:K82FM showed AME(n) higher than CMFM and CFM. The results indicated that both K6 and K82 keratinase had a positive effect on the protein quality of the feather meal produced by the enzymatic–hydrothermal method.