Relationship between temperature and nutrition on laying performance

Abstract

Birds are homeothermic animals, and because it can maintain the relatively constant body temperature regardless of the ambient temperature in which they operate, since the range where the thermal comfort zone is observed. The great productivity of laying depends on the set of measures that meet the needs of animals in nutrition, health, genetics and wellness. Being a homeothermic animal, the ambient temperature is a parameter related to the rated thermal comfort, and the thermal neutral zone required so that the bird can fully express their genetic potential and there is greater use of nutritional strategies. The ability of birds to direct the energy consumed for maintenance, weight and number of eggs is directly related to the environmental conditions in which they are housed. So environments with high temperatures or too low can affect the performance of the birds, not only for food intake, but also the energy deviation spent by the animal in an attempt to maintain constant body temperature. The ratio temperature/nutrition must be analyzed and taken into account in the creation of commercial laying hens in order that the variation of ambient temperature mainly regulates food intake triggering a series of reactions that adversely affect the bird nutrition. Thus, we present a review of the interaction between temperature and nutrition for that there is the best performance of laying hens.