Abstract
This study was conducted to compare the efficacy of herbal methionine (HM) to synthetic methionine (SM) in broiler chickens. The herbal methionine (Meth-o-Tasr®) was supplied by lntas Pharmaceutical Limited, India. The HM and SM were added to standard diets at 0, 0.5, 1.0 and 1.5 kg/ton of finished feed and fed to 168 Arbor Acre broiler chickens. After seven days pre-experimental period, the birds were randomly allocated to seven isonitrogenous and isocaloric dietary treatments in a completely randomized experimental design with factorial arrangement of treatments. Each treatment was replicated four times with six birds per replicate. The trial lasted for 56 days and was divided into two phases; the starter phase and the finisher phase. The final body weight, body weight gain, feed intake and feed conversion ratio (FCR) of the birds were determined on a weekly basis. At the end of the feeding trial, two birds per replicate were randomly selected and slaughtered for the determination of carcass quality traits and biochemical and haematological profiles. The average final body weight, body weight gain and average feed intake of the birds fed on diets supplemented with SM were significantly different (P ≤ 0.05) from those fed on diets supplemented with HM at both starter and finisher phases. The birds on SM supplemented diets gained more body weight and consumed more feed than those on HM supplemented diets. Feed conversion efficiency was not affected (P ≥ 0.05) by the dietary methionine source. Birds on SM supplemented diets had better (P ≤ 0.05) carcass yield than those on HM and control diets. Dietary HM supplementation did no significant (P ≥ 0.05) effect on any of the biochemical or haematological variables determined. It can be concluded from this study that, though no detrimental health effects, were detected, dietary HM is not an effective substitute for synthetic methionine for optimum production performance. Key words: broiler chickens, herbal methionine, performance, synthetic methionine.
Highlights
Despite the advances made in poultry nutrition in the last few decades, a lot of nutritional problems still remain unresolved
The initial body weight, final body weight, body weight gain, feed intake and feed conversion ratio for both starter and finisher phases are presented in Tables 2 and 3
A source by level interaction was observed in average final body weight, average body weight gain, and average feed intake
Summary
Despite the advances made in poultry nutrition in the last few decades, a lot of nutritional problems still remain unresolved. One of the most critical areas is amino acid nutrition. Of the essential amino acids required for poultry, methionine is usually the first to be limiting in diets based on maize and soybean meal (Fancher and Jensen, 1989). Methionine plays a significant role in energy production and protein synthesis. It enhances production and the size of the eggs, overall growth of the birds, feed conversion efficiency, and livability of broilers and layers (Binder, 2003 and Aerni et al, 2005). Methionine is a potent donor of methyl groups, which
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