Effect of Different Levels of Feed Added Black Seed (Nigella sativa L.) On the Performance of Broiler Chicks

Effects of Nigella sativa on Performance, Blood Profiles, and Antibody Titer against Newcastle Disease in Broilers

“…Comparison of the vaccinated group (T1) with the unvaccinated group (T0) indicated that vaccination had a little ( p > 0.05) adverse effect on weight gains of the chickens as expected due to vaccination stress. As shown in Figure 1 , our results about the efficacy of N. sativa supplementation on the performance of broiler chickens are in agreement with the results obtained by Miraghaee et al [ 24 ], Ghasemi et al [ 38 ], Hossain et al [ 39 ], and Ali et al [ 47 ] who reported that 1% N. sativa seeds in diet improved the performance of broiler chickens but there are some differences between our results with those obtained by Shewita and Taha [ 37 ] who observed a higher weight in chickens fed with 2% N. sativa seed supplementation diet when compared with the weight of those that received 10% of N. sativa seeds in their diet, or Durrani et al [ 36 ] who reported a higher weight gain in 40 g/kg (4%) of N. sativa seeds in the diet. Overall, most studies indicate that a higher percentage of N. sativa seeds in the diet may reduce feed intake and finally affects the average weight of broiler chickens as observed in this study ( Table 2 ) for groups T6 (8% N. sativa seeds) and T7 (16% N. sativa seeds), and the mean of the latest differed significantly ( p < 0.05) from those of the control (T0-T1) groups ( Figure 1 ).…”

“…A significant ( p =0.04) difference between antibody titers of group T3 and group T1 indicates that dietary inclusion of 1% N. sativa seeds had the highest immunomodulatory effects, while that of group T7 (16% N. sativa seeds) had immunosuppressive effects. The results observed during this study ( Figure 2 ) indicate that N. sativa is able to promote antibody response (mostly IgG) in chickens as previously reported [ 5 , 17 , 29 , 36 , 47 , 48 ]. Higher antibody titers (log 2 –7.4 ) of chickens (group T3) observed during this study are in the range of expected titers that could be induced via vaccinations by two live plus one killed vaccines [ 49 , 50 ].…”

“…Our observation on a decrease in lymphocytes percentage together with an increase in antibody titers following vaccination against Newcastle diseases is controversial to the results obtained by Islam et al [ 52 ] who reported a decrease in antibody titer together with a rise in peripheral lymphocytes with an explanation that the numbers of antigen-specific-antibody secreting B-cells were less. As recent reports indicated that N. sativa has induced a significant increase in antibody titers against Newcastle disease (ND) and infectious bursal disease (IBD) in broilers [ 29 , 36 ], therefore, the reasons for this controversy results may be due to the nature of pathogenic agents, type of treatments (vaccination versus challenge), kind of experimental animal, different components and dosage of N. sativa , and the role of macrophages in the activation of Th2 cells and their roles in the activation of B-cells for further differentiation into plasma cells. For example, the increase in antibody titer against avian infectious bronchitis (IB) has been observed by Durrani et al [ 36 ] but has not been observed by Al-Beitawi et al [ 29 ] or various dosages of N. sativa had different effects on antibody titers against different pathogenic agents (ND, IBD, and IB) in same experimental animals “broiler chickens” [ 36 ].…”

“…sativa as a multipurpose feed additive on performance, blood profiles, and humoral immune responses in broiler chickens. To the best of our knowledge, the closest reports to our study in the literature are works of Al-Beitawi et al [ 29 ], Durrani et al [ 36 ], Shewita and Taha [ 37 ], Ghasemi et al [ 38 ], Hossain et al [ 39 ], Shirzadegan et al [ 40 ], Singh and Kumar [ 41 ], and Aydogan et al [ 42 ], and the present study has a lot of differences with them including the use of various percentages of N . sativa seeds in diets and weekly measurement of performance, immune responses, serum biochemical parameters, hemogram, and leukogram indices.…”

The Effect of Rose Water (Rosa damascena mill) Supplementation in Broiler Rations on Growth Performance, Some Carcass Parameters and Intestinal Histomorphology

“…These studies are in line with our findings. There are many studies, using in broiler diets of various aromatic plants and extracts, the feed conversion ratio did not affect (Franciosini et al, 2016;Yildirim et al, 2018) and were affect (Durrani et al, 2006;Kumari et al, 2007;Rezaei et al, 2015). The differences observed between the results are thought to depend on the conditions of the poultry, the moisture content of the feed, the environmental factors and the type of plant extracts used, the dose, the amount of volatile fatty acids.…”