The effectiveness of dietary sunflower meal and exogenous enzyme on growth, digestive enzymes, carcass traits, and blood chemistry of broilers

Abstract

High costs of conventional protein feed sources including soybean meal (SBM) generated the need for finding other alternatives. Thus, the present study was designed to evaluate the impact of graded replacements of SBM by sunflower seed meal (SFM) with or without enzyme supplementation on growth performance, digestive enzymes, carcass traits, and blood profile of broiler chickens. A total of 240 unsexed 1-week-old broiler chicks (Hubbard) were randomly divided into eight treatment groups of 30 chicks each in five replicates each of six chicks in a factorial design (4 × 2) arrangement, including four levels of SFM (0, 25, 50, and 75% replacing SBM) and two levels of enzyme (0- or 0.1-g/kg diet) supplementation. Performance traits including feed conversion ratio, body weight, and weight gain were significantly (P < 0.01) improved with increasing SFM up to 50% substitution for SBM or with enzyme supplementation in broiler diet during the experiment. However, feed intake of broiler chicks was decreased with enzyme supplementation (P < 0.05). The activities of digestive enzymes (protease and amylase) were significantly (P < 0.05) influenced and enhanced by SFM and enzyme inclusion in diets, respectively. The activities of protease and amylase were improved with SFM diet supplemented with 0.1 g/kg enzyme in comparison with those with the un-supplemented diet. The evaluated carcass traits were not statistically (P > 0.05) influenced by feeding SFM meal or enzyme addition. Biochemical blood parameters were significantly (P < 0.01) affected by SFM, enzyme, or their interaction in broiler diets, except for globulin that was not affected by dietary enzyme. It is concluded that increasing SFM level in the diet up to 50% replacing SBM with the supplementation of enzyme improved the growth performance and enhanced positively carcass traits as well as the activity of digestive enzymes in broiler chickens.

Effect of Different Dietary Inclusion Levels of Sunflower Meal and Multi-Enzyme Supplementation on Performance, Meat Yield, Ileum Histomorphology, and Pancreatic Enzyme Activities in Growing Quails

“…No significant effect was found for the multi-enzyme supplementation on carcass parameters except for relative liver weight which was increased by supplementation of multi-enzyme to the quail diets. These results partially agree with Mushtaq et al [31] and Alagawany et al [19] who demonstrated that all carcass parameters were not affected by the addition of enzymes in broiler diets. The effect of interactions between dietary SFM level and multi-enzyme addition on relative breast, liver, heart, gizzard, and proventriculus weights in quails were statistically significant, but this was not the case for other parameters measured (p > 0.05).…”

“…The results of previous studies stated that SFM could be included up to 15% [8,19] and 20% levels [10,11] in the diet with no negative effects on performance parameters such as BWG or FCR in broilers. In addition, Christaki et al [29] noted that the BW, FI, and FCR of quails were not significantly affected by dietary SFM ranging from 3.5% to 6.5% levels.…”

“…However, Moghaddam et al [7] stated that dietary SFM levels in broilers affected the relative thigh, liver and gizzard weights, but did not affect the relative breast weight. Alagawany et al [19] noted that the carcass traits of broilers was not affected by dietary SFM levels except for the relative heart weight, which was decreased with dietary SFM supplementation. In addition, Bilal et al [11] demonstrated that dietary SFM level did not affect carcass parameters and relative organ weights, but did improved gizzard weight in broilers.…”

“…The SFM contains 4.5% soluble and 23% insoluble nonstarch polysaccharide (NSP) [17]. However, the digestive system of monogastric animals has poor potential to produce enzymes that can digest NSP such as cellulose, glucan, xylan, so the use of exogenous enzymes in the diets of these animals is important in terms of NSP digestion [18,19]. Therefore, the addition of enzymes to diets containing raw materials such as SFM containing NSP increases digestion and consequently improves the performance of the birds.…”

Effect of a low-energy and enzyme-supplemented diet on broiler chicken growth, carcass traits and meat quality

“…In addition, supplementation with enzyme enabled a reduced-energy diet to be adopted. On the contrary, other studies have reported that supplementing enzymes in the maize-SBM diet does not affect broiler chicken performance (Marsman et al, 1997;Kocher et al, 2002;Meng and Slominski, 2005;Alagawany et al, 2018a). KEMZYME ® is a multiple-enzyme product containing multiproteases, multiamylases and nonstarch polysaccharide (NSP) hydrolyzing enzymes, which has been specifically developed to improve nutrient availability and release extra amino acids and energy in multisubstrate broiler rations such as maize-SBM and wheat-SBM.…”