Effect of herbal and immunomodulatory supplements on growth performance and meat quality in broilers

Abstract

This study aimed to evaluate the effect of herbal and immunomodulatory die-tary supplements and their combinations on growth performance, slaughter traits and meat quality in male broiler chickens. A total of 210 one-day-old Ross 308 male chickens were randomly distributed after weighing in 7 groups (3 replicates in each, n=10 chickens). Broilers were reared on deep litter until 42 days of age and divided as follows: Group I – control (basal diet without supplements); Group II – supple-mented with 0.2% Immunoßeta; Group III – supplemented with 0.2% garlic powder; Group IV – supplemented with 0.2% herbal mix (0.05% ginger, 0.05% rosemary, 0.05% thyme and 0.05% yarrow); Group V – supplemented with 0.2% Immunoßeta + 0.2% garlic powder; Group VI – supplemented with 0.2% Immunoßeta + 0.2% herbal mix; Group VII – supplemented with 0.2% Immunoßeta + 0.2% garlic powder + 0.2% herbal mix. At the end of the experiment, chickens weighed from 2552±54 g (Group I) to 2689±55 g (Group IV) without statistically significant differences (Р>0.05). Feed conversion varied from 1.64 (Group IV) tо 1.74 (Group I). Meat pH, water holding ca-pacity, water absorption capacity, and tenderness were not influenced by the dietary supplement type. All supplements used did not show an adverse effect on health, and no mortality was found in the experimental groups. The obtained results show a clear trend towards a positive effect of the used feed additives and their combination mainly on the fattening characteristics of the broiler chickens, evident from the higher values of the two efficiency indices.

Keywords

• broilers
• herbal additive
• garlic powder
• immunomodulatory
• slaughter traits