In pursuit of a better broiler: growth, efficiency, and mortality of 16 strains of broiler chickens

To meet the growing consumer demand for chicken meat, the poultry industry has selected broiler chickens for increasing efficiency and breast yield. While this high productivity means affordable and consistent product, it has come at a cost to broiler welfare. There has been increasing advocacy and consumer pressure on primary breeders, producers, processors, and retailers to improve the welfare of the billions of chickens processed annually. Several small-scale studies have reported better welfare outcomes for slower-growing strains compared to fast-growing, conventional strains. However, these studies often housed birds with range access or used strains with vastly different growth rates. Additionally, there may be traits other than growth, such as body conformation, that influence welfare. As the global poultry industries consider the implications of using slower growing strains, there was a need for a comprehensive, multidisciplinary examination of broiler chickens with a wide range of genotypes differing in growth rate and other phenotypic traits. To meet this need, our team designed a study to benchmark data on conventional and slower-growing strains of broiler chickens reared in standardized laboratory conditions. Over a 2-year period, we studied 7,528 broilers from 16 different genetic strains. In this paper, we compare the growth, efficiency, and mortality of broilers to one of two target weights (TW): 2.1 kg (TW1) and 3.2 kg (TW2). We categorized strains by their growth rate to TW2 as conventional (CONV), fastest-slow strains (FAST), moderate-slow strains (MOD), and slowest-slow strains (SLOW). When incubated, hatched, housed, managed, and fed the same, the categories of strains differed in body weights, growth rates, feed intake, and feed efficiency. At 48 d of age, strains in the CONV category were 835 to 1,264 g heavier than strains in the other categories. By TW2, differences in body weights and feed intake resulted in a 22 to 43-point difference in feed conversion ratios. Categories of strains did not differ in their overall mortality rates.