Feeding value of field bean (Vicia faba L. var. minor) for laying hen pullets

. Concerns over the sustainability of using soybean in poultry diets, has steered the need to develop alternative protein sources for modern poultry production. This experiment examined the effect of nine different United Kingdom grown field bean ( Vicia faba L. var. minor ) cultivars from the same harvest year on apparent metabolizable energy (AME) and dry matter digestibility (DMD) when fed to Hy-Line Brown pullets from 14 to 16 weeks of age. A balancer feed was formulated to contain 11.54 MJ/kg AME and 166.4 g/kg crude protein. Nine nutritionally complete, meal-form diets were then prepared by mixing 200 g/kg of each field bean cultivar with 800 g/kg of balancer feed, making a total of ten diets. Each diet was fed to eight cages containing two birds. AME was determined via total collection technique over the last four days of the study. Relationships were examined between AME and the chemical composition of the beans. The overall determined AME value of the beans ranged from 9.31 MJ/kg DM to 12.26 MJ/kg DM, giving an average AME of 10.94 MJ/kg DM ( P < 0.001). Total non-starch polysaccharide (NSP) content of the beans negatively correlated with their determined AME ( P < 0.05) and also tended ( P = 0.066) to negatively reduce AME based on regression analysis. There is evidence that total NSP may be used by nutritionists to predict AME value of field beans, however, stronger evidence is required. This information may be used by plant breeders to aid in the development of new field bean cultivars.