Effects of aqueous extract of red propolis as an alternative to synthetic antimicrobial for quails enhanced egg quality and maintained health status

Abstract

This study aimed to determine the effects of aqueous extract of red propolis (RP) as an alternative to synthetic antimicrobial for quails enhanced egg quality and maintained health status. A total of 120 laying quails with 52 days of age were were randomly allotted to dietary treatments and six replicates of five birds each in completely randomized design. There were four dietary treatments as following: Control (TC), with enramycin (TE), 1g RP/kg of feed (RP1), 2g RP/kg of feed (RP2) in concetrated diet raised for 63 days. The results of productive performance such as percentage of egg production, feed intake per quail per day, average egg weight, egg mass, foods conversions showed no significant difference between treatments. The quails fed with red propolis in fresh eggs showed darker yolk (P < 0.05), with higher intensity of red and lower intensity of yellow; as less than 6.0 pH yolk; microbiological characteristics analyzed on the surface of eggs and feces of quails was lower and less than compared with other treatments. It is possible to conclude that red propolis showed promising results to be used as a feed additive for laying quails, since it maintained the productive performance of these animals and caused qualitative improvements in the physicochemical and microbiological characteristics of the eggs.