Trouw Nutrition’s eggshell quality programme

Produce more first-class eggs

When every decision impacts your animal performance and business success, you want to build on more than just intuition.

The challenge of first-class eggs

As a layer producer, you need to monitor all kinds of production and economic factors that can have an impact on profitability – from egg production percentage, number and weight to feed cost and intake. In many cases, what you measure will be driven by consumer preferences, economic market forces and other trends. Although input costs are important, the greatest enabler for success is the production and sale of top-quality eggs: a higher number of marketable eggs means higher profits.

Careful selection of commercial laying hens has successfully increased production cycle lengths from 70 to 80 weeks, or even longer: current targets are for long-life layers capable of producing 500 eggs at 100 weeks of age Among hens in the late-lay life-stage, however, it is much more difficult to maintain good eggshells, which makes ongoing first-class egg production a challenge.

Improve the quality of your eggshells with our fully integrated programme

Trouw Nutrition has developed a holistic, global programme specifically designed to empower our customers to improve eggshell quality, even in late lay. By implementing a set of proven solutions and recommendations in the fields of feed, farm and health, our integrated approach ensures both animal health and farmer profitability, all while safeguarding environmental and public health.

Our eggshell quality programme is built on strong technical foundations, using the latest findings from Trouw Nutrition’s state-of-the-art poultry research centre in Spain – unique among our peers in terms of size, quality, capacity, expertise and experience in the poultry sector.

Based on this research, which has been successfully tested in practice, the programme features three technology areas:

Feed

Addresses the different eggshell components and provides nutritional recommendations to ensure proper shell formation during the entire laying cycle (assuming no major health/ environmental issues occur).

To learn more about our feed approach, click here

Feed offering:

  • Updated eggshell nutritional recommendations (premix)
  • IntelliBond Z/M/C & Optimins to complement your diets
  • Farm-O-San Shellboost to promote the absorption and mobilisation of calcium

Farm

Addresses the most common management and housing challenges that affect eggshell quality and provides on-farm advice and preventative measures.

Farm offering:

  • Split-feeding® for optimised diets during the day
  • Online courses (e-learning) to boost knowledge about on-farm management practices
  • On-farm training and advice from our experts

Health

Addresses the primary pathogens and other health-related issues that lead to poor eggshell quality and provides diagnostic tools and solutions to help support these challenges.

To learn more about our health approach, click here

Health offering:

  • Recommendations for common health issues
  • Supportive additives: Selko pH, Selacid GG, Presan to improve gut health
  • Farm-O-San AHS & NutriCool to support layers during heat stress periods

Three simple steps to stronger eggshells

The Trouw Nutrition solution to stronger eggshells consists of three simple steps, which you can do yourself or with the help of one of our poultry experts.

  1. It all starts with diagnostics: by applying Trouw Nutrition’s diagnostic tools, you can easily find the cause(s) of eggshell quality issues on your farm. Trouw Nutrition has developed an online diagnostic form that, having been assessed by our technical expert, will lead to the right diagnosis based on the information and pictures taken from your farm.

  2. After diagnosing the problem, Trouw Nutrition can provide solutions in the fields of feed, farm and health to improve eggshell quality problems.

  3. Time to look to the future: our programme contains on-the-job training and online courses to educate layer producers on how to avoid eggshell quality problems in their next cycle, and the next, and the next ... Based on our latest research and experiences, our prevention solutions equip you to better manage your new flocks, with improved producer economics as well as enhancements to your animals’ health, welfare and environment. Interested to learn more? Reach out

Eggshell Quality Diagnostic Protocol

Please complete this diagnostic protocol to understand where improvements on eggshell quality can be made

Our Feed offering

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IntelliBond

  • Hydroxy minerals with OptiSize technology (better mixing)
  • Unique crystalline structure
  • High metal potency
  • Improved essential nutrient stability in feed
  • Reduce essential nutrients antagonisms in the Gi tract
  • Slow release of metal

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Optimin

  • Organic Trace Minerals chelated with proteinates
  • Optimin trace minerals are FAMI-QS certified, meaning quality controls are performed on every batch ensuring quality, safety and performance

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IntelliOpt

IntelliOpt is an innovative species-specific trace mineral solution utilising both organic and hydroxy trace minerals sources together in a synergistic blend which consistently delivers high metal bio-availability at a cost-effective price

Our Health offering

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Selko pH

Selko pH is a feed additive used in drinking water. It lowers the pH (acidity) in the crop and stomach of a hen, in turn improving the digestion of nutrients including calcium – needed to form the eggshell.

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Selacid GG

Selacid GG improves the digestion of nutrients in poultry, enhancing stable and proximal intestinal microbiota and resulting in healthier and optimally performing animals.

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Presan

Presan-FY is a feed additive that improves gut health in poultry, so the hen can make optimal use of nutrients contained in the feed. This improved intestinal health, especially in challenging situations or during high performance phases, will lead to better egg production.

With this programme we have combined our proven nutritional solutions with our knowledge about farm and health management. This unique combination will help you maximise the number of first grade eggs.
Hubert Smeets - Global Product Manager Poultry

Recognising the cause of the 10 most common eggshell quality issues

Eggshell Quality - Poster
pdf (380kB)

Want to find out how to improve your eggshells? Or do you need support identifying the cause of your eggshell issues?

Let us help you increase the number of first grade eggs and improve your farms’ profitability.