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Rat meal

Datasheet

Description
Click on the "Nutritional aspects" tab for recommendations for ruminants, pigs, poultry, rabbits, horses, fish and crustaceans
Common names 

Rat meal

Feed categories 
Related feed(s) 
Description 

In many countries there are established rat control programs, and rats that have been killed can be collected and processed to produce rat meal, which can then be used as a supplementary protein source for animals. Only very limited research has been conducted to assess the feeding characteristics of rat meal.

Nutritional aspects
Potential constraints 

As with any other animal derived product, care needs to be taken to ensure that adequate heat is applied during the processing to destroy any pathogenic organisms that might be present. If rats were poisoned, then caution needs to be taken to assure that the type of poison used will not be harmful to animals that the rat meal is fed to.

Poultry 

Two experiments in the Philippines have studied the inclusion of rat meal in broiler diets. Rat meal was prepared from freshly collected dead rats in newly ploughed rice and maize fields. The rats were boiled, sun-dried for 3-4 days and hammer-milled. In the first experiment, rat meal was included in broiler diets at 0, 4, 8, 12% and performance (growth) was increased (Aquino et al., 1987). In a second trial, broilers fed 10% rat meal had similar or higher growth than broilers fed 10% fish meal or 10% shrimp meal (Aquino, 1985).

Nutritional tables
Tables of chemical composition and nutritional value 

Avg: average or predicted value; SD: standard deviation; Min: minimum value; Max: maximum value; Nb: number of values (samples) used

Main analysis Unit Avg SD Min Max Nb
Crude protein % DM 65.0 1
Gross energy MJ/kg DM 24.2 0.7 23.5 25.4 5
 
Poultry nutritive values Unit Avg SD Min Max Nb
AMEn cockerel MJ/kg DM 18.5 *
AMEn broiler MJ/kg DM 18.5 *

The asterisk * indicates that the average value was obtained by an equation.

References

Aquino, 1985; Cox et al., 2007

Last updated on 24/10/2012 00:45:44

References
References 
Aquino, R. R. ; Aquino, E. N., 1987. Rat meal in poultry diet. Philippine J. Vet. Anim. Sci., 13 (4): 47-48 web icon
Aquino, R. R., 1985. Growth performance of broilers fed rat, shrimp and fish meals as protein sources. Philippine J. Vet. Anim. Sci., 11 (3-4): 32 web icon
Cox, C. L. ; Secor, S. M., 2007. Effects of meal size, clutch, and metabolism on the energy efficiencies of juvenile Burmese pythons, Python molurus. Comparative Biochemistry and Physiology, Part A: 148 (4): 861–868 web icon
3 references found
Datasheet citation 

Tran G., 2015. Rat meal. Feedipedia, a programme by INRAE, CIRAD, AFZ and FAO. https://www.feedipedia.org/node/669 Last updated on October 2, 2015, 16:21

English correction by Tim Smith (Animal Science consultant) and Hélène Thiollet (AFZ)
Image credits