Tibia development in turkeys and chickens as affected by early-age feed restriction.

Tibia development was studied by histomorphometry in male chickens and turkeys fed ad libitum throughout the growing period, or subjected to an early-age (1-week) severe feed restriction for 6 and 14 days, respectively. In turkeys, the rates of longitudinal bone growth and epiphyseal width growth, both dependent on the activity of chondrocytes, proceeded rapidly and reached maxima at early ages of 24 and 11 days, respectively. Moreover, longitudinal bone growth and the growth of epiphyseal width were reduced during early-age feed restriction, in both chickens and turkeys. On the other hand, the rate of growth of metaphyseal width, determined by activity of bone cells such as osteoclasts and osteoblasts, reached in turkeys a maximum at the relatively late age of 70 days, and was not influenced by feed restriction. Rhythmic variation characterized the temporal behavior of the height of the hypertrophic and non-hypertrophic zones of the growth plate, the trabecular width, and the osteoclasts number at the subchondral region. Rhythmicity appeared similar in both ad libitum-fed and early-age feed-restricted birds of both species. The height of the non-hypertrophic epiphyseal cartilage appeared not to change, whereas the hypertrophic zone decreased with age and early-age feed restriction, demonstrating the importance of cartilage cell hypertrophy as a main determinant of longitudinal bone growth. Sexual maturation was accompanied by the disappearance of both hypertrophic and non-hypertrophic zones of the epiphyseal growth plate and the end of bone elongation. Trabecular width at the end of bone elongation. Trabecular width at the subchondral region increased while osteoclast number decreased with age, reflecting the net increase in bone mass, but were not affected significantly by early age feed restriction. Compensatory growth of the early-age feed-restricted birds, resulted in the complete recovery of affected bone variables within a few weeks of resumed ad libitum feed intake.