Aim: The present study was carried out to evaluate the effect of supplementation of garlic, ginger and their combination in the diets of broiler chickens and assessment in terms of feed intake, growth performance and economics of feeding.
Materials and methods: A total of 240 1-day-old Cobb-400 broiler chicks were randomly assigned to four dietary treatments each with three replicates of 20 chicks per replicate (n=60). Four experimental diets were formulated in such a way that control diet (T1) contained neither ginger nor garlic. While, birds in group T2 and T3 were fed with diets containing 1% garlic and ginger, respectively. Diet 4 (T4 group) contained a combination of 1% of garlic and ginger. The feeding experiment was carried out for 42 days, and different parameters evaluated includes feed intake, weight gain, feed conversion ratio, gut morphometry, and economics of feeding in terms of return over feed cost (ROFC) and European Performance Efficiency Index.
Results: Feed intake of experimental birds in ginger and mixture of garlic and ginger supplemented groups, i.e., T3 and T4 groups have significantly (p<0.05) higher feed intake as compared to control. While, feeding of garlic have non-significant effect on feed intake as compared to other groups. A body weight gain (g/bird) was found to be significantly (p<0.05) higher in garlic (T2 group) and ginger (T3 group) supplemented group as compare to control and garlic and ginger mixture supplemented group (T4 group). Feed conversion ratio was significantly (p<0.05) lower in ginger (T3 group) supplemented group as compare to other groups. Mean villi length, villi width and cryptal depth were significantly (p<0.05) higher in T3 group than rest of all three groups, indicating increased absorptive surface area. ROFC was significantly (p<0.05) lower in T3 and T4 groups as compare to control. However, it was not significantly different between control and T2 group.
Conclusion: On the basis of the results of the study, it is concluded that supplementation of garlic improves the performance of broilers when added at the rate of 1% of broiler ration and can be a viable alternative to antibiotic growth promoter in the feeding of broiler chicken.
Keywords: body weight; broiler chickens; feed intake; garlic; ginger.