No abstract

This study determined the effects of dietary intake of Moringa Oleifera (M. oleifera) leaf meal on growth performance of pullets. Two hundred and forty Isa Brown day-old chicks were randomly allotted to 4 different treatment groups and each treatment had 3 replicates of 20 chicks each. At 4th week of age, birds in group 1 (T1)were fed with 16% crude protein (CP) grower diet (control feed; 0.0% M. oleifera) whereas birds in groups 2 (T2), 3 (T3) and 4 (T4) received the control feed supplemented with 2.5%; 5.0% and 7.5% M. oleifera leaf meal, respectively. Results indicate that although intake of M. oleifera leaf meal did not affect final body weight and weight gain of the pullets (P greater than 0.05), feed intake of the pullets declined significantly (P less than 0.05) as the amount of dietary M.oleifera intake was increased from 2.5% to 7.5%. Feed conversion ratio of T4 group was better (P less than 0.05) than those of control birds.

Moringa oleifera leaves richly contain numerous nutrients that can be used to induce performance in animals and when supplemented in layer feeds can improve the feed intake, body weight, egg qualities and mineral content of the eggs. The study was aimed to determine the performance of layers, egg quality and mineral profile of the eggs produced by inclusion of varying percentages of M. oleifera leaf powder in the feed of layers. Two hundred and forty Isa-brown layer birds were offered 0%, 2.5%, 5.0% and 7.5% M. oleifera leaf powder supplemented feeds respectively, using a completely randomized design. The mineral analysis was done following the procedure of the Association of Official Analytical Chemists using atomic absorption spectrophotometer. Data collected were analysed using analysis of variance at 0.05 level of significance. The results indicated that the body weight, feed intake, FCR, egg weight, egg length and shell thickness were significantly higher in layers fed M. oleifera leaf powder. However, the laying percentage was significantly higher in the control. The phosphorous, sodium, zinc, manganese, iron, copper, selenium and chromium contents of the eggs increased as the percentage of moringa inclusion increased. The eggs produced by layers fed with 5% M. oleifera leaf powder had significantly highest contents of magnesium, potassium and calcium, but decreased with further supplementation of moringa. The findings indicated that the supplementation of M. oleifera leaf powder at various levels improves the mineral contents of eggs but this is significantly achieved at a higher inclusion rate.