Study on Growth Performance of Broiler Supplemented with Organic Acids in their Diet as an Alternative to Antibiotics

An experiment was conducted in a completely randomized design to determine the effects of feeding organic acids as an alternative to antibiotics in the diet of broiler chicken at IAAS, livestock farm from February 20 to April 7, 2006. There were altogether 7 treatments replicated thrice and each experimental unit consisted of 10 birds. The treatments were Standard ration(SR)( T1), SR + antibiotics (T2), SR + 300 mg ascorbic acid/kg diet (T3), SR + 0.02 % acify ( T4), SR + 0.03 % acify (T5), SR + 300 mg ascorbic acid/kg diet + 0.02 % acify (T6) and SR + 300 mg ascorbic acid/kg diet + 0.03 % acify (T7). The commercial acidifier used was acify (0.2ml/lit, 0.3ml/lit of drinking water), chlortetracycline and ascorbic acid were used at the rate of 500 mg/kg and 300 mg /kg of feed.. The average weekly body weight for 3 week was found significant (P<0.05) and maximum body weight (729.53 g) in broilers fed onT7. A significantly higher (P< 0.05) live weight gain was observed on the third and the fifth week in broilers fed on T7. The significant differences in feed consumption were observed, and maximum feed consumption (639.97 g), (865.0 g) and (1146.75 g) were observed in birds fed on T3, T6 and T2 for the third, fourth, and sixth week respectively. Feed efficiency for the third week was significantly (p< 0.05) poor (2.03) in T3.