Resumo
The commercial poultry industry requires the use of poultry litter. Therefore, the main purpose of using broiler litter is to provide comfort to the birds, with wood shaving and rice husk being the most widely used raw materials. On the other hand, there is a search for alternative materials in the main intention to reduce costs. Therefore, in order to evaluate the use of vegetable charcoal as broiler litter, an experiment with 225 broiler chicks divided into three treatments (T1 = broiler chicks housed in wood shaving (WS) litter; T2 = broiler chicks housed in 50% WS litter and 50% charcoal chaff (CC); T3 = broiler chicks housed in 100% CC, with five replicates of 15 birds each was performed. Performance (feed intake, weight gain, feed conversion) in periods of one to seven, one to 21, 21 to 41 and one to 41 days of age was assessed. The dry matter, ash, phosphorous and nitrogen levels on the litter were assessed at the end of the trial period. Sample fragments were taken from the trachea and lungs to evaluate possible changes related to the presence of chaff at the end of the trial period. There were no significant differences in the broiler performance. Also, no histopathological lesions were found on the organs of birds raised in litters. In the conditions this experiment has been developed, it can be concluded that it is possible to use CC as broiler litter since it has not affected the broiler performance and has not caused injury to the birds' respiratory tract.(AU)