Abstract

The current study aimed to investigate the effects of supplementing diet of broiler chickens with hemicell enzyme on performance, carcass characteristics, growth parameter, blood parameters and ileal digestibility of nutrients. One hundred and eighty day-old Ross 308 strain broiler type chickens were randomly assigned to three treatments with five replicate pens containing 12 birds in each experimental diets containing 0, 0.5, and 1 g/kg of hemicell enzyme. All diets were calculated to be iso-nutritive to meet or exceed the nutrient requirements recommended by the National Research Council (NRC, 1994) for broilers. Growth parameters were estimated for each group using Gompertz model (2008). At day 35, titanium oxide (1 g/kg of feed) was added to all diets for five days and used as an analytical marker to determine digestibility of dry matter, organic matter, crude protein and crude fat. At 6 weeks of age, blood samples were collected via wing vein to harvest plasma for biochemical analyses. During the starter phase, grower phase and the course of study, body weight gain, feed intake and feed conversion ratio (FCR) did not significantly differ among the treatments (P>0.05). Hemicell enzyme in broiler diets had no significant effect on dressed weight, kitchen carcass, breast muscle, thigh and gizzard percentages (P>0.05), but had significant effect on heart and liver percentages (P<0.05). The diets had no significant effect on growth parameters and growth rate of broiler chickens estimated by Gompertz model (P>0.05). Dietary inclusion of hemicell enzyme significantly increased plasma concentration of glucose (P = 0.064). Plasma concentrations of cholesterol, triglycerides and very low density lipoprotein (VLDL) were not affected by the dietary treatments (P>0.05). Plasma concentrations of high density lipoprotein (HDL) and low density lipoprotein (LDL) concentration were significantly affected by enzyme supplementation (P<0.05). The ileal digestibility of fat and protein was significantly improved by hemicell enzyme addition (p<0.05). The results of this study showed that supplementing broiler diets by hemicell enzyme did not improve production performance and ileal digestibility of crude fat and crude protein in broiler chickens.

Key words: Hemicell enzyme, broiler chickens, growth parameter, blood factors, ileal digestibility.