The Effect of Proportion of Crumbled Copra Meal and Enzyme Supplementation on Broiler Growth and Gastrointestinal Development

Abstract

The effect of proportion of crumbled copra meal and enzyme inclusion on bird performance and gastro-intestinal response was studied. Three diets with two enzyme treatments were each fed to four replicates of 10 broilers from 1 to 42 days of age. The diets contained 300 g kg^-1 crumbled copra meal and were fed either as a finely ground or crumbled or a mixture of 50/50 finely ground and crumbled copra meal, each with or without an enzyme supplement (Hemicell plus Allzyme SSF). Feeding the crumbled copra meal diet, which had the largest crumble sizes, increased body weight, live weight gain, feed intake and water consumption of birds. The gizzard size of birds fed crumbled copra meal in their diets was significantly larger and heavier than for birds fed the fine mash copra meal diet. The inclusion of enzyme significantly increased body weight and live weight gain of birds fed until 6 weeks of age. The duodenum, ileum and overall size of intestines of birds fed the supplemented copra meal diet were larger and heavier than those of birds fed the diet without enzyme supplementation. Including crumbled copra meal in the diet had a beneficial effect in increasing the productivity of birds and supplementation of a copra meal based diet with enzymes was additionally beneficial.