Performance of broiler chickens fed diets containing rice offal supplemented with enzyme

Abstract

A feeding trial of six weeks was conducted to determine the effect of including rice offal supplemented with natuzyme on the performance of broilers. One hundred and seventy two 2 –week old broilers of mixed sexes were randomly allocated to four diets in a completely randomized design. The broiler chicks were allocated one of four diets containing either 0 (control), 5, 10, or 15% of rice offal. The starter diets were isonitrogenous (25% CP) but decreased in energy levels from 2,779.32 (Diet A), 2,747.73 (Diet B), 2,715.54 (Diet C) to 2,683.54kcal/kg ME (Diet D). The finisher diets were also isonitrogenous at 21% CP with each diet replicated three times. The energy levels of the finisher diet decreased from 2801.67 (diet A) to 2703.22 kcal/kg ME (diet D). The energy levels on diets B (2768.72) and C (2736.18) were higher than on diet D. All diets containing rice offal were supplemented with natuzyme at 100g/100kg feed. Overall result showed that feed intake was significantly lower (p<0.05) on the control (117.38g/bird/day) than on diets B (123.57), C (125.24) and D (123.97g/bird/day). Weight gain was significantly higher (p<0.05) on diet B (57.64g/bird) than on diets C (50.77) and D (46.88g/bird) respectively. Water intake was significantly lower (p<0.05) on the control (204.60mL/bird) than on diets B (240.44), C (231.86) and D (225.73mL/bird), respectively. Feed conversion ratio was significantly better (p<0.05) on diets A (2.36), B (2.23) and C (2.68) than on diet D (3.06) only. Feed cost/kg gain was significantly (p<0.05) better on diet A (N532.65) than on diets B (N666.75) and C (N688.92) only. Initial weight did not differ significantly across the diets but final weight was better (p<0.05) on diet B (2644.40g/bird) than on the control and other rice offal diets. Even though the control diet had lower feed intake, birds on diet B had better weight gain, feed conversion ratio, feed cost/gain and final body weight than the control and other rice offal diets and is therefore, recommended. This is because rice offal based diet on diet B has a cost saving of 8.33% over the control diet.