FIG 1.

Galacto-oligosaccharide diet improves the growth performance of broiler chickens. (A) GOS diet trial 1 comparing median body weight of birds fed the GOS diet with that of birds fed the control (ctl) diet. Data presented are for the mass observations made for the 10 birds from each cohort that remained at 35 days and hence were recorded throughout the trial. The contemporary male Ross 308 broiler chicken performance objective weight progression (96) is indicated by the gray dashed line. Panel B shows a box-and-whisker plot of the bird weights for trial 1 at 35 da. Panels C and D show box-and-whisker plots of the bird weights at 35 da for ancillary GOS diet trials 2 and 3 to demonstrate that the birds on the GOS diet consistently achieved greater body weight at 35 da than birds provided with a calorie-matched control diet. For reference, the contemporary male Ross 308 performance objective at 35 da is indicated by a horizontal dashed black line in each panel (96). Comparisons were made of mean weights using Student’s t test, with the corresponding P values reported above the diet pairs and the corresponding cumulative feed conversion ratios (FCR) indicated in the bottom right-hand side of each trial panel.