Table 4.

Egg characteristics from hens fed diets containing 1,681, 8,348, 18,348, 35,014, or 68,348 IU of D₃/kg of diet during first cycle laying phase.

Dietary cholecalciferol	Egg weight	Haugh unit1	Relative yolk weight	Relative albumen weight	Relative shell weight	Eggshell thickness	Egg specific gravity	Eggshell breaking strength
(IU of D3/kg of diet)	(g/h)		(%)	(%)	(%)	(mm)		(kg)
1,681 (control)	59.0	85.8a	27.2	57.7	9.5	0.399	1.072b	4.32b
8,348	58.5	84.5b	27.3	57.7	9.7	0.415	1.073a,b	4.56a
18,348	58.5	86.5a	27.5	57.6	9.6	0.402	1.073b	4.38a,b
35,014	58.5	85.8a	27.4	57.7	9.6	0.397	1.074a,b	4.51a
68,348	59.1	84.5b	27.3	57.9	9.7	0.405	1.075a	4.56a
Pooled SEM	0.19	0.31	0.10	0.15	0.04	0.0057	0.0004	0.045
	P Value
Treatment (ANOVA)	≤ 0.05	≤ 0.01	0.22	0.69	≤ 0.05	0.28	≤ 0.01	≤ 0.01
Time	≤ 0.01	≤ 0.01	≤ 0.01	≤ 0.01	≤ 0.01	≤ 0.01	≤ 0.01	≤ 0.01
Treatment × time	≤ 0.01	0.76	0.89	0.65	0.32	0.55	≤ 0.05	0.45

¹Haugh unit = 100* log (h-1.7* w^3.7+ 7.6); h = observed height of the albumen in millimeters; w = egg weight in grams

^a–bLeast square means without a common superscript differ in post hoc analysis (P ≤ 0.05).