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Abstract

An experiment was carried out to assess the optimum turmeric concentration and ideal mating ratios for Japanese quails (Coturnix coturnix japonica) for production performance of fertile eggs and hatchability. A total of 162 ten weeks old females and 27 males were assigned in the study. They were fed on a commercial layer quail diet containing approximately 18 % crude protein and 3000 kcal of metabolizable energy (ME)/kg and reared for 12 weeks in three mating ratios: 1:4, 1:6 and 1:8. (male: female), each replicated three times. A total of 540 selected hatching eggs per batch of incubation were collected and less than 7 days stored, then were incubated for hatching performance. Percentage of average egg production (AEP-%), feed intake (FI-g), feed conversion ratio (FCR), egg weight (EW-g), egg mass (EM-g/bird) and hatching performance were determined. It was observed that FI were the only performance production affected significantly (P<0.001) by feeding a commercial diet mixed with liquid turmeric. Mating ratios influence FI and FCR (P<0.001). Most hatching performances were affected by turmeric and sex ratios, except dead in-shell and normal quail chicks. The values of AEP (87.16%) and EM (8.42 g/bird/d) were the highest performance with 10 g/kg of turmeric. The ratio of 1:4 was the best mating ratio for local quail breed with highest records of all hatching performances significantly.