GROWTH PERFORMANCE OF STARTER BROILER CHICKENS FED DIET CONTAINING LEAF MEAL COMPOSITE AS ALTERNATIVE TO COMMERCIAL BROILER PREMIX

Abstract

This study produced composite leaf meal (CLM) from four vegetables to replace commercial premix in broiler diets. Fresh Telfairia occidentalis, Vernonia amygdalina, Piper quinenses and Ipomea batata leaves were harvested, air-dried and milled separately and were later mixed in equal proportion (ratio 1:1:1:1) into a composite meal and used to replace broiler commercial premix at 0.00 (0.25% premix), 0.125 (0.125% premix), 0.63 (0.0% premix), 0.125 (0.0% premix), 0.188 (0.0% premix) and 0.25% (0.0% premix) reduction levels of commercial premix and designated diets 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 respectively.Treatment one (T1) served as the control. One hundred and eighty broiler chickens were used in a three weeks experiment. The chicks were allocated to six dietary treatment each having thirty birds, replicated thrice with ten birds each in a Completely Randomized Design. The birds were fed formulated diet, the test material was introduced from the first day, feed and water were provided ad libitum. Data was obtained for analysis. The result reveals that the Average Daily Feed Intake (ADFI), Average Daily Weight Gain (ADWG), Total Feed Intake (TFI) and Final Body Weight (FBW) were all
significantly (P<0.05) affected by the dietary treatment. Feed Conversion Ratio (FCR) was not significantly (P>0.05) different among all treatment groups including the control, although, the control was numerically lower than T2, T3 and T6 while T4 and T5 were lower than the control. In all parameters evaluated for growth performance, T4 and T2 were different from the control, though T3, T5 and T6 were not significantly (p>0.05) different from the control, there were all numerically higher than the control. It can be concluded conceivably within the limit of this study that the replacement of commercial broiler premix with CLM could help to stem over dependence of broiler farmers on importation of premix.