Table 3. Body weight gain, feed intake, and feed efficiency of layer and broiler chickens fed a diet with various metformin concentrations.
| Experiment 1 (Layer) |
Experiment 2 (Broiler) |
||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Metformin (mg/kg) |
Week | Body weight gain (g) |
Feed intake (g) |
Feed efficiency (%) |
Body weight gain (g) |
Feed intake (g) |
Feed efficiency (%) |
| 0 | 0–1 | 46.4±2.4 | 109.3±2.6 | 42.5±2.2 | 163.0±8.8 | 216.4±8.6 | 75.1±1.4 |
| 1–2 | 40.9±3.5 | 124.4±4.4 | 32.8±2.8 | 174.4±12.8 | 321.4±14.0 | 54.3±3.4 | |
| 150 | 0–1 | 53.8±2.5 | 117.3±3.5 | 45.8±1.6 | 162.6±7.9 | 210.2±7.0 | 77.1±1.7 |
| 1–2 | 44.1±3.5 | 140.1±5.1 | 31.5±1.9 | 200.8±18.6 | 347.9±20.0 | 57.9±4.6 | |
| 300 | 0–1 | 46.0±1.7 | 105.8±2.8 | 43.5±1.4 | 139.6±5.8 | 198.7±4.7 | 70.2±2.0 |
| 1–2 | 50.4±5.0 | 144.5±17.2 | 36.1±3.6 | 156.9±16.0 | 302.7±29.5 | 51.9±3.7 | |
| Analysis of variance (probability) | |||||||
| Metformin | 0.21 | 0.37 | 0.66 | 0.06 | 0.27 | 0.13 | |
| Week | 0.19 | <0.01 | <0.01 | <0.05 | <0.01 | <0.01 | |
| Metformin x Week | 0.11 | 0.26 | 0.36 | 0.48 | 0.48 | 0.91 | |
Values are given as mean±SE. The number of chickens used in each treatment group was 8.