Observations on Feeding Cholic Acid to Broilers

It has long been known that bile has an important role in the digestion and absorption of lipids from the gastro intestinal tract of animals. An excellent review of the role of bile in lipid absorption is given by Deuel (1955). In view of the recent practice of incorporating large quantities of lipids in chicken diets it appeared desirable to investigate the effect of supplementing high fat diets with cholic acid. Two trials were conducted to determine the effect of cholic acid supplementation of the ration on growth rate, feed efficiency and fat retention of broilers. The composition of the basal ration used in these studies is given in Table 1. The blended fat product that was used as a source of fat was analyzed by gas liquid chromatography and found to have the following fatty acid composition; myristic 2.3%, myristoleic 0.5%, palmitic 26.1%, palmitoleic 5.8%, stearic 15.7%, oleic 43.2% …