Effect of Dietary L-Arginine on Productive Performance of Broiler Chickens

Abstract

2 Abstract: A total of 300 one day old Ross 308 broiler chicks were used in this study to determine the effect of supplementing ration with different levels of arginine on productive performance of broiler chickens. The chicks were allocated for 4 treatment groups (75 chicks for each group) and each treatment was consisted of five replicates with 15 chicks each. Treatment groups were: C: control group (without any addition of arginine); T1, T2 and T3: adding arginine to the diet of broiler chickens at levels of 0.02, 0.04 and 0.06%, respectively. Two types of diets were used over the period of experiment, starter diet was used from one to 20 days of chick s' age and then grower diet was used till the end of the experiment (46 days of age) . Productive traits included in this study were live body weight, weight gain, feed intake, feed conversion ratio, production index, economic figure and livability. Results revealed that feeding diets containing arginine (T1, T2 and T3) resulted in significant increase (p<0.05) in live body weight, weight gain, feed intake and feed conversion ratio during the most period of experiment and with relation to accumulative weight gain, accumulative feed intake and accumulative feed conversion ratio as compared with control group (C). However, adding arginine to the diet of broiler chickens resulted in significant increase (p<0.05) in production index, economic figure and livability in comparison with control group. In conclusion, dietary arginine supplementation resulted in significant improvement in productive traits included in this study. So arginine can be used as effective feed additive for improve productive performance of broiler chickens.