Utilization of agricultural wastes in animal nutrition is a matter of great concern. Dried citrus pulp (DCP) is a potential source of some valuable nutrients for animal and poultry. In an experiment with completely randomized design, the effect of different levels (0%, 4%, 8%, 12%, and 16%) of DCP was evaluated on performance, egg quality, and blood parameters of laying hens from 25 to 37 weeks of age. The birds were randomly allocated to five groups with six replicates and three birds in each replicate. The results showed that with increasing the level of DCP up to 12%, there were no significant differences among treatments for feed intake, egg production, egg mass, feed conversion ratio, final body weight, yolk index, and yolk color. There were no significant differences between treatments in shell thickness, eggshell index, egg score, and Haugh unit. Utilization of DCP up to 16% significantly increased serum glucose and high-density lipoprotein and reduced cholesterol, low-density lipoprotein, and triglycerides (P < 0.05). Results of the present study indicated that use of 12% DCP in laying hen diets had no adverse effect on performance and egg quality of laying hens in early phase of production.

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This experiment evaluated the effects of two fat sources on performance, some blood parameters and carcass characteristics of broiler chicks. One hundred and eighty day-old broiler chicks were randomly assigned to five dietary treatments (three replicates of 12 birds per treatment). The experiment was performed as a completely random design (CRD) and birds were fed isoenergetic and isonitrogenous diets containing no fat (control), 20 and 40 g soyabean oil, 20 and 40 g beef tallow/kg feed from 11 -42 d of age. Food intake and body weight gain both increased significantly with supplemental level of both fat sources, the rate in food intake being higher with soyabean oil than with beef tallow. Feed conversion ratio decreased significantly with both sources in the period 29 -42 d. Serum triglyceride and very low density lipoprotein (VLDL) contents were unaffected by dietary oil inclusion but cholesterol, high-(HDL) and low (LDL) density lipoprotein contents increased significantly with oil level. Serum glucose (GLU) content decreased significantly with increasing oil inclusion. In all cases the blood parameters responded significantly differently to the two supplemental fat sources with the rate of reduction in GLU, cholesterol and LDL, and the rate of increase in TG, HDL and VLDL being greater with soyabean oil than with beef tallow. Liver and abdominal fat percentages increased significantly with supplemental fat inclusion. The results indicate that supplementation of broiler diets with up to 40 g soyabean oil/kg feed significantly improved the performance and reduced serum cholesterol, LDL and abdominal fat in comparison with chicks receiving diets containing beef tallow. ________________________________________________________________________________

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This study was conducted to evaluate the effects of prebiotic (Fermacto) in low protein diet on serum cholesterol and intestinal microbiota of broiler chicks. One hundred and fifty six 1-day old Ross 308 broiler chicks of both sexes were used for 42 days. The chicks were randomly allocated to 12 pens containing 13 chicks each with 3 replicates and assigned to receive one of the 4 dietary treatments of 2 levels of protein (low and high) and 2 levels of prebiotic (0 and 0.2%) in a completely randomised design with factorial arrangement. There were no significant differences in serum HDL and LDL levels among treatments. Significant differences were observed in serum cholesterol and intestinal microflora between the high protein diet without prebiotic and the low protein diet containing prebiotic (P<0.05). The results of the present experiment showed that the addition of prebiotic to broiler diets containing 90% of the NRC protein recommendation significantly affects serum cholesterol and intestinal microflora of broiler chicks (P<0.05)

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Today the use of enzymes is common in practical poultry nutrition. Enzyme supplementation usually result in numerous beneficial effects, such as increased utilization of nutrients (e.g. fat & protein), improved AME values, increased growth rate, improved feed conversion ratio, decreased viscosity of intestinal digesta, reduced incidence of sticky excreta and improved litter conditions (Broz and Ward., 2007). The use of multi enzymes to improve the digestibility of corn-soybean meal-wheat diets for broilers is less well documented than wheat and barely diets. Therefore, the aim of the present study was to examine the effects of a multi-enzyme supplementation on the performance of broiler chicks fed on corn-soybean meal-wheat diets.