EFFECTS OF DIFFERENTLY PROCESSED RUBBER SEED MEAL BASESD DIETS ON PERFORMANCE AND EGG QUALITIES OF LAYING HENS

Abstract

This study was conducted to evaluate the effects of incorporation of differently processed rubber seed meal (RSM) in layers mash on the performance of laying hens and egg qualities. The seed used were manually dehulled and differently processed, using roasting (RRSM) and soaking in hot water (HWRSM) methods. The RSMs were incorporated into laying hens diets as replacement of soybean meal at 0, 15, 25 and 35%. The results revealed no significant variations in all performance variables measured. The regression analysis indicates that only 6.2, 6.6 and 7.9% of the variations in final weight, weight gain and rate of laying respectively were due to the dietary treatments. Dietary treatment also responsible for 3.7 and 13.2% of the variations observed in feed intake and feed conversion ratio of the birds. The performance of laying hens recorded in term of egg weight, hen day egg production, yolk index, Haugh units and shell thickness were higher than what was reported by previous researchers for birds fed soybean based diets from different countries. Egg weight, egg mass output, albumen weight of the test diets were higher than that of control diets, they increase as the levels of incorporation of RSM increases. This affirm the fact that RSM can perform as much as soybean meal in the feed of laying birds. The performance of RSM based treatments could be linked to nutrient quality of RSM. Rubber seed was reported to be higher than soybean in essential amino acid with higher rate of digestibility.