EFFECT OF DIFFERENT LEVELS OF TRACE MINERAL SOURCES ON PERFORMANCE OF COMMERCIAL BROILER CHICKEN

Abstract

An experiment set up to evaluate the effect of different levels of trace mineral sources on growth performance of commercial broiler chicken. A total of 120 day old cobb – 400 broiler chicks was allotted into 5 groups with 4 replicates of 24 birds each. Control diet supplemented with 100 percent inorganic trace minerals (ITM) while, experimental diets 2, 3, 4 and 5 supplemented with 75 percent ITM and 25 percent organic trace minerals (OTM), 50 percent ITM and 50 percent OTM, 25 percent ITM and 75 percent OTM and 100 percent OTM, respectively. Growth performance was measured at the end of 1^st, 2^nd, 3^rd, 4^th, 5^th and 6^th weeks. Results indicated that, chicks fed diet containing 100 percent OTM had significantly (p<0.05) higher body weight, body weight gain and gave better feed conversion ratio compared to chicks fed control diet. It is concluded that, replacing inorganic minerals with organic minerals improved bird’s growth performance.