Department of Animal Nutrition, College of Veterinary Science, S.V. Veterinary University, Rajendra Nagar, Hyderabad-500 030, India.
*Reprint request: Dr. Y. Ramana Reddy, E-mail: ramanayr19@yahoo.co.in.
A complete diet formulated with detoxified neem (Azadirachta indica) cake was processed into three different physical forms viz. mash, expander-extruded pellets and steam pellets. These three diets were compared with a conventional ration in a 180-day growth trial using twenty four Nellore ram lambs (18.81±0.5) divided into four groups of six lambs each in a completely randomized design. The average daily gain was significantly (P<0.05) higher on pelleted diets in comparison to that on control and mash diets. No significant (P>0.05) differences with regard to dressing percentage, primal cuts, proportion of lean, bone and fat, and edible and inedible ratio could be observed due to incorporation of detoxified neem seed cake. Further, pelleting the diet decreased the feed cost per kg gain by 14.95 to 15.50 and 10.93 to 11.5 per cent compared to control and mash diets. Hence, neem seed cake can be incorporated into complete diet after detoxification with out any deleterious effect on growth and meat quality. Among the processing methods expander-extruder processing cost can be preferred over steam pelleting because of low processing as compared to steam pelleting.
Neem seed cake, Complete diet, Processing, Growth rate, Carcass characteristics
