The nutritive value of palm kernel cake and its application in low quality diets of broiler chickens

The aim of this study was to evaluate the nutritive value of palm kernel cake (PKC) and to investigate its effect on growth performance of broiler chickens. Firstly, the dry matter (DM) digestibility, metabolic energy (ME) of PKC was determined. Secondly, a total of seven hundred 18-day-old Sanhuang broilers were randomly divided into 5 treatments with 7 replicates of 20 broilers each. Broilers were received basal diets without (T0 group) or with 2% ( T1 group), 4% (T2 group), 6% (T3 group), 8% (T4 group) PKC supplementation throughout the trial period. The experiment lasted for 18 days after a five days prefeeding period. The growth performance [average daily gain (ADG), average daily feed intake (ADFI), and feed to meat ratio (F/G)] were measured. The results showed that the DM, crude protein (CP), crude fiber (CF), crude fat (EE), crude ash, calcium (Ca), phosphorus (Pi) and gross energy (GE) content of PKC was 91.30%, 15.87%, 14.31%, 10.41%, 3.73%, 0.34%, 0.57% and18.28 MJ/kg respectively. There are 17 kinds of amino acid (AA) in PKC, and had a total AA content of 13.26%. The apparent DM digestibility and true DM digestibility of PKC was 24.11% and 28.73%, respectively. The apparent metabolizable energy (AME) and true metabolizable energy (TME) of PKC was 7.73 MJ/kg and 8.41 MJ/kg, respectively. Dietary PKC supplementation had no effects on the final body weight (FBW), ADG, ADFI and F/G of broilers, while, there was a significant linear relationship between PKC and ADFI (y=0.2006x+73.63, R-2=0.8358, p=0.0298). The feed cost were decreased with the increased of PKC supplementation, and the relative economic benefit in T2 group (4% PKC), T3 group (6% PKC), T4 group (8% PKC) was decreased by 1.07%, 0.89%, 0.36%, respectively, only the 2% PKC group increased the relative economic benefit by 0.71% compared with control group. In conclusion, the supplementation of PKC up to 8% in low quality diets did not affects the growth performance of broilers, but considering the economic benefit, it is advisable to add 2% PKC in the diet of broilers.