Effect of dietary ω6/ω3 on growth performance,carcass traits,meat quality and fatty acid profiles of Beijing‐you chicken

The effects of varying the ω6 to ω3 fatty acid ratio (ω6/ω3) of diets on growth performance, carcass traits, meat quality and fatty acid composition of breast muscle were investigated in Beijing‐you chickens grown to 92 days. A total of 360 one‐day‐old female BJY chickens were fed diets containing 0%, 0.12%, 0.42%, 1.00% or 1.97% linseed oil replacing equal weights of maize oil to make dietary ω6/ω3 to be approximately 30:1, 20:1, 10:1, 5:1 and 2.5:1. Subcutaneous fat thickness and intramuscular fat content increased significantly in birds fed up to 10:1 ω6/ω3. a* values (redness of meat, dimension of the CIELAB‐system) progressively increased as the diets contained increasing ω3 content, up to the 10:1 ω6/ω3.The changes in b* (yellowness of meat, dimensions of the CIELAB‐system) were also significant but the pattern was almost the reverse of changes in a*. Shear force increased significantly as dietary ω6/ω3 was reduced from 30:1 to 5:1. Decreasing the dietary ω6/ω3 clearly decreased the content in breast muscle of C20:1 and C22:1, but increased that of C24:1. C20:4, C20:5 and C22:5, increased significantly by decreasing the dietary ω6/ω3, and the birds fed the 10:1 diet had higher contents of C22:6 than other treatments. This study has clearly demonstrated that decreasing the dietary ω6/ω3, increases the deposition of desirable ω3 and ω6 long chain PUFA in the edible tissue, thereby achieving nutritionally enriched meat.