Vet World   Vol.18   December-2025  Article - 33 

Comparative effects of corn, wheat, and barley diets on broiler growth performance, carcass traits, meat quality, and consumer sensory evaluation

Background and Aim: Corn is the main cereal used in broiler nutrition because of its high energy content and carotenoid richness, while wheat and barley offer alternative nutrient profiles that may increase production flexibility. However, their relative impacts on broiler performance, carcass traits, meat physicochemical properties, and consumer sensory perception under standardized enzyme-supplemented conditions remain unclear. This study examined the effects of partially replacing corn with wheat or barley on growth performance, carcass yield, meat quality, and consumer sensory evaluation in broiler chickens. 

Materials and Methods: A total of 525 male ROSS 308 broilers were randomly assigned to three dietary treatments: corn (C), corn–wheat (CW), and corn–barley (CB), with five replicates of 35 birds each. Diets were isocaloric and isonitrogenous and supplemented with a xylanase–β-glucanase complex. Birds were raised for 35 days under controlled environmental conditions. Growth performance, carcass traits, meat color (L*, a*, b*), pH, water-holding capacity, texture profile, and consumer sensory attributes were evaluated using standardized protocols. Data were analyzed using General Linear Model procedures with significance set at p < 0.05. 

Results: Broilers fed with corn showed numerically higher body weight gain (+4.8% compared to CW; +4.4% compared to CB) and a tendency toward improved feed conversion ratio (1.52 vs. 1.56–1.58; p = 0.10). Including barley significantly increased abdominal fat (+36% vs. corn; p = 0.04), while wheat resulted in the lowest fat deposition. Meat yellowness (b*) was highest in the corn group at both 45 min and 24 h postmortem (p < 0.05, p < 0.01), reflecting the higher carotenoid content of corn. No significant differences were found among treatments for pH, drip loss, cooking and thawing loss, texture parameters, or sensory scores (p > 0.05). All sensory attributes scored above 4.3 on the 7-point scale. 

Conclusion: Moderate inclusion of wheat (12%–20%) or barley (8%–15%) in enzyme-supplemented diets did not affect growth performance, carcass yield, meat physicochemical traits, or consumer sensory acceptance. Wheat might be used strategically to reduce abdominal fat, while corn remains preferred when enhanced yellowness is desired. These findings support the practical use of wheat and barley as viable alternatives to corn in commercial broiler feeding programs. 

Keywords: Broiler, Growth performance, Carcass quality, Meat quality, Consumer sensory evaluation, Corn, Wheat, Barley.

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How to cite this article: Kongkasem, P., Rakangthong, C., Kongman, P., Prasongsook, S., Sudtilak, K., & Poeikhampha, T. (2025) Comparative effects of corn, wheat, and barley diets on broiler growth performance, carcass traits, meat quality, and consumer sensory evaluation, Veterinary World, 18(12): 4117–4128.

Received: 06-09-2025   Accepted: 21-11-2025   Published online: 27-12-2025

Corresponding author: Theerawit Poeikhampha    E-mail: agrtrw@ku.ac.th

DOI: 10.14202/vetworld.2025.4117-4128

Copyright: Kongkasem, et al. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http:// creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated.