Utilization of fishmeal in broiler chicks Ration as protein source substitute to Imported super concentrate

Abstract

The study was conducted to evaluate the nutritive value of locally produced fishmeal . A total of "120" day old , unsexed commercial chicks were used for this study . the experiment was inform of completely randomized design . Chicks were allotted randomly to three treatments ( 40 birds / treatment ) with four replicates( 10 birds/ replicate) . The birds were fed for six weeks . The three diets were formulated to be isonitrogenous ( 23% curude protein ) and isocaloric ( 3.100 Kcal / Kg) metabolizable energy .The control diet contain super concentrate, the other fishmeal with or with out lysine and methionine supplementation. Health of the stock and performance parameters were recorded . Results obtained showed that chicks fed fishmeal only have significantly ( p < 0.05 ) consumed less feed intake compared to chicks fed diets contain super concentrate , this condition was the same for the body growth rate . The addition of lysine and methionine to the diet containing fishmeal improved feed intake and growth rate to a level less than that containing super concentrate . The result showed that feed conversion ratio has no significant difference ( p > 0.05 ) among the tested treatments.