Research Note: Effects of riboflavin on reproductive performance and antioxidant status of duck breeders

An experiment was conducted to investigate the effects of dietary riboflavin levels on reproductive performance, riboflavin status, and antioxidant status of laying duck breeders, to estimate the requirement of this vitamin for duck breeders. Different levels crystalline riboflavin (0, 2.5, 5, 10, and 15 mg/kg) were supplemented to a corn–soybean–corn gluten meal basal diet to produce 5 dietary treatments with different analyzed total riboflavin levels (1.48, 3.20, 6.30, 11.71, and 16.83 mg/kg). A total of 80 White Pekin duck breeders aged 40 wk were allotted to 5 dietary treatments of 16 birds each (8 replicates per treatment and 2 breeders per replicate), and all birds were raised individually for 9 wk. At the end of the experiment, reproductive performance, tissue riboflavin concentrations, and antioxidant status of White Pekin duck breeders were measured. The results showed that body weight, egg weight, egg production, and egg fertility were not affected by dietary riboflavin levels. However, among all of the laying duck breeders, the birds fed the basal diet without riboflavin supplementation had the lowest egg hatchability, plasma riboflavin, egg yolk riboflavin, and egg albumen riboflavin (P < 0.001). In addition, the duck breeders fed the basal diet without riboflavin supplementation showed the lowest antioxidant capacity indicated by greatest plasma malondialdehyde (MDA) content and lowest reduced glutathione content, total superoxide dismutase (T-SOD) activities, and total antioxidant capacity in both plasma (P < 0.001) and egg yolk (P < 0.001). These results revealed that dietary riboflavin supplementation improved the reproductive performance and antioxidant status of the duck breeders. According to the broken-line model, the riboflavin requirements (based on dietary total riboflavin) of laying duck breeders in terms of the egg hatchability, plasma riboflavin, egg yolk riboflavin, egg albumen riboflavin, plasma T-SOD activity, and plasma MDA content were 3.19, 7.42, 3.88, 7.44, 6.45, and 8.84 mg/kg, respectively.