EFFECTS OF CHANGING FEED BRAND AND FREQUENCY OF FEEDING ON THE OVERALL PRODUCTIVITY OF LAYING HENS

Abstract

Increasing cost of feed ingredients, seasonal availability and a host of other factors causes scarcity of proprietary poultry feeds. This forces farmers to change feed brands very often. This research work was carried out to evaluate effects of changing feed brand and frequency of feeding on the overall productivity of laying hens. Four hundred and eighty (480), 53 weeks old Isa Brown layers were used for the 8 weeks feeding trial. The birds were randomly allocated in a 5 x 2 factorial arrangement to five feeding dynamics (D1 AC only; D2 TF only; D3 weekly alternation of TF & AC; D4 Alternation
of TF & AC every two weeks; D5 Monthly alternation of TF & AC) and two feeding frequencies (Twice & Thrice daily feeding).The results showed that feed intake, egg production and feed conversion efficiency were not significantly (P >0.05) affected. From the findings of this research, changing feed brands in the short, medium and long term as well as feeding twice or thrice daily did not affect production performance.