Effect of Garlic Supplementation in the Diets of Cockerel Chicks on Performance and Economy of Production

Abstract

A feeding trail was conducted to determine the effect of garlic supplementation (0,1.5,3.0 and 4.5%) in the diet of 240 day old cockerel chicks on growth performance, economy of production, nutrients digestibility, hematological and serum indices, four treatments with 3 replicates each of 20 birds each were adopted in a complete randomized design. The four diets used were almost isocaloric and isonitrogenous,while data collected were subjected to ANOVA. The diets had comparable levels of nutrients, initial body weight (90.0 g), daily weight gain per bird (6.02 ± 0.39 g), and fuel conversion ratio (5.43 ± 0.5 g), while the daily fuel intake per board was significantly (P<0.05) varied and least at 4.5% inclusion level, with corresponding highest (#25,489) profitability and best (P<0.05) digestibility of crude protein, NFE and ether extract. Highest (P<0.05) PCV, Hb, RBC, WBC and lymphocyte was obtained at 4.5% level of inclusion, with corresponding high level of plateles and significantly (P<0.05) depressed urea (3.13 g/dl). The use of garlic in cockerel chicks’ nutrition up to 4.5% is beneficial, for the enhancement of growth, digestibility wellbeing and profitability.