Response of Laying Hens to Omega-3 Fatty Acids for Performance and Egg Quality

Abstract

With the growing awareness among the general public, the demand for food products rich in omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids (n-3 PUFA) has increased over the years. Hen eggs enriched with n-3 PUFA are serving this purpose. Several earlier trials indicated that the addition of n-3 PUFA-enriched feed stuffs in laying hen rations readily promoted the n-3 PUFA contents of egg yolks. A major increase was noticed for linolenic acid content in the egg yolk and also for long chain n-3 PUFA. The egg cholesterol was also decreased to some extent by feeding n-3 PUFA-enriched diets to laying hens. However, the production performance and egg characteristics have been questioned in some of the studies conducted on n-3 PUFA feeding to laying hens. The major problem mentioned was a decrease in the egg weight and egg-yolk weight. It is suggested that more consideration should be given to the performance and egg characteristics in future studies on feeding n-3 PUFA to laying hens.