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Effect of raw, cooked and roasted pigeon peas - based diets on performance characteristics and blood chemistry of broiler chickens
Abstract
An experiment was conducted to examine the effect of raw, whole-cooked, crushed-cooked, whole-roasted and crushed-roasted pigeon peas on performance characteristics, haematology and serum enzymes of broiler chickens. A total of 120 day-old unsexed broiler chicks of the Marshall strain were randomly allotted to six dietary treatments. The experiment ran for eight weeks. Feed intake was more significantly (P<0.05) reduced in birds fed raw pigeon peas. Body weight gain, feed conversion efficiency and protein efficiency ratio were significantly (P<0.05) reduced in birds fed raw, whole – roasted and crushed – roasted pigeon peas respectively. Haematological studies showed higher significant (P<0.05) reductions in haemoglobin, red blood cells, packed cell volume and white blood cells of birds fed raw pigeon peas than those fed whole – roasted and crushed – roasted pigeon peas respectively. Serum enzymes, glutamic pyruvic transaminase and glutamic oxaloacetic transaminase were significantly (P<0.05) increased in birds fed raw, whole – roasted and crushed – roasted pigeon peas respectively. Birds fed whole – cooked and crushed – cooked pigeon peas had better values of the response indices. Moreover, the best significant (P<0.05) improvements in the response indices were obtained in birds fed crushed – cooked pigeon peas.
Keywords: Pigeon peas, processing, broilers and response indices
