Raw pejibaye meal, prepared using whole pejibaye fiuits (Bactris gasipaes H B K), contained 0.88g dry matter, 0.0649 crude protein, 0.1299 ether extract, 0 . 0 4 3~ crude fibre and 0.6199 N-j?ee extract per gram of pejibaye meal. Three experiments were conducted to evaluate the use of pejibaye meal ( P M ) raw (RPM), sun-exposed (SPM), autoclaved ( A P M ) or extruded (EPM) in diets for broilers or white Leghorn cockerels. I n Experiment I , using increasing dietary levels of RPM to replace maize, broilers had significantly poorer performance as the content of RPM increased. I n a second trial, no improvement in performance was noticed when 0.5 or 1.0 RPM or SPM was substituted for sorghum. However, when 0.5 or 1.0 APM replaced sorghum, broilers showed better performance than controls. When EPM was used at proportions of 0-2 and 0.4 of the diet (Experiment 3 ) Leghorn cockerels had a better performance than controls with maize. Again, a detrimental efect was noticed in feed intake and weight gain even with low levels of RPM. Higher levels of RPM (0.2 and 0.4) caused the birds to perform very poorly. I t was concluded that inclusion of RPM depressed food intake and growth rate, as did SPM. However, APM or EPM gave a performance as good as or better than maize or sorghum controls. PM could replace the grain portion of diets for chickens if it is suitably heat-treated.
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