Assessment of the impact of grower experimental diets on early laying performance of Black Harco

Abstract

This study was conducted to determine the effect of feeding grower experimental diets containing 2,400, 2,500 and 2,600 kcal/kg (T1, T2 and T3) of ME on the early laying performance of 180 Black-Harco laying birds from 9 - 19 weeks of age. The effect of feeding a commercial diet of unknown composition containing 2500 kcal/kg of ME purchased from vital feed selling outlet was also evaluated. At the end of the growing phase, birds were assigned to a common layer diet for eight weeks and maintained within the same treatments of 45 birds and replicates of 15 birds used in the grower experiment.The results indicated that feeding high energy diets during the growing period tend to promote onset of lay. However, once laying starts, birds reared on the lower energy diets (2,400-2,500 kcal/kg) reached peak production level earlier within 205 to 208 days. However, at 50% egg production level, birds reared on the commercial diet weighed (1.70 kg) heavier (P<0.05) than those reared on the other treatments. These results indicate that in this ecological zone birds could be raised on diets containing 2,400-2,600kcal/kg without compromising laying performance. However, in order to fully appreciate the effect of dietary energy levels in this ecological zone, more trials could be conducted using wider energy variations.