Guanidinoacetic acid as a partial replacement to arginine with or without betaine in broilers offered moderately low crude protein diets

Guanidinoacetic acid (GAA) is the direct precursor of creatine and can spare arginine (Arg) for creatine synthesis in low crude protein (CP) broiler diets. This study aimed to determine the extent GAA could spare Arg in broilers offered low CP diets and if supplemental betaine provides additional benefits. Seven hundred twenty-day-old Ross 308 male broilers were assigned into 9 dietary treatments with 8 replicates of 10 birds each. The treatments were; normal CP diet, a low CP (−15 g/kg) diet deficient in Arg, a low CP diet sufficient in Arg, and low CP diets with GAA, where 0.1% added L-Arg was spared by GAA at 50, 100, and 150% with and without 0.1% betaine. The treatments were offered during grower (d 10–24) and finisher (d 25–42) phases. The birds offered a low CP Arg deficient diet had 7.8% lower weight gain, 10 points higher FCR, 8.5% lower breast meat yield, 27.2% lower breast meat creatine concentration and 30.4% more abdominal fat pad compared to those offered a normal CP diet. When Arg was added back to the Arg deficient diet, growth performance, breast meat yield and creatine concentration loss were restored. When GAA spared Arg at 150%, feed intake, weight gain, FCR, breast and abdominal fat yields, breast meat moisture, drip loss, and breast meat creatine concentration became comparable to Arg sufficient low CP and normal CP treatments. When GAA spared Arg at 100 and 50%, FCR was 3 and 5 points lower than the normal CP treatment. Breast meat creatine concentration was positively correlated to feed efficiency (r = 0.70, P < 0.001) and breast meat moisture (r = 0.33, P < 0.01), and negatively correlated to relative weight of abdominal fat (r = −0.37, P < 0.01) and breast meat pH (r = −0.49, P < 0.001). There were no benefits of adding betaine with GAA on the parameters measured but the results with GAA were consistent in the presence or absence of betaine.