EFFECTS OF VARIOUS PROTEIN SEED CAKES AS REPLACEMENT FOR FULL FAT SOYBEAN MEAL ON THE HAEMATOLOGICAL CHARACTERISTICS AND SERUM BIOCHEMICAL INDICES OF BROILER CHICKEN

Abstract

An 8-week feeding trial was conducted at the Teaching and Research Farm, Federal College of Education (Technical), Gombe to find out alternative non-conventional protein feed sources that could be used to replace full-fat soybean. Three hundread 1-day-old broiler (ROSS) chickens were fed commercial diets for seven days. The birds were afterwards randomly allotted to five dietary treatments with four replicates, 15 birds per replicate. The rations-based diets were full-fat Soybean meal, Soybean cake, Groundnut cake, Sesame seed meal, and Palm kernel cake designated as diets T1, T2, T3, T4, and T5. respectively. The results for blood haematological and serum parameters showed that there was no significant (P>0.05) difference among the treatment means for packed cell volume, red blood cells, white blood cell, haemoglobin, eosinophils, lymphocytes, monocytes, and neutrophils but there was a highly significant (P < 0.01) difference in basophils, and a significant (P < 0.05) difference was obtained in Mean Corpuscular Volume (MCV). The results for serum biochemical blood indices revealed that there was no significant difference (P>0.05) among the treatment means for total protein, globulin, albumin, total calcium, and ionized calcium but a significant (P< 0.05) difference was obtained in the cholesterol where diets T1 and T5 were the highest. Based on the results obtained in this study, it can be concluded that, with the exception of diet T5 (Palm kernel seed cake), all the other seed cakes used can effectively replace full-fat soybean meal without negative effect on blood haematological and serum parameters in broiler chickens.