Effect of dietary supplementation of Azadirachta indica leaf meal on production performance, egg quality and serum biochemical profile of Vanaraja laying hens

Gayathri, S.L., Babu, L.K., Pand, A.K. and Panigrahi, B. 2020. Effect of dietary supplementation of Azadirachta indica leaf meal on production performance, egg quality and serum biochemical profile of Vanaraja laying hens. Indian Journal of Poultry Science, 55(3): 183-188.

An experiment was conducted to study the effect of dietary supplementation of neem (Azadirachta indica) leaf meal (NLM) on production performance, egg quality and serum biochemical profile of Vanaraja laying hens. One hundred twenty, Vanaraja laying hens (24 weeks) were randomly selected and divided into four groups of 30 each with three replicates of 10 in each group. Four experimental diets were fed to birds in which T₁ (control-antibiotic powder-oxytetracycline @ 50g/ quintal) and the other three treatment groups T₂, T₃ and T₄, were fed diets with NLM at levels of 0.25, 0.5 and 1.0 per cent, respectively. Production performance parameters were nonsignificant among the different groups except for egg weight (g). The egg quality parameters did not differ significantly among the treatment groups. Serum biochemical parameters were comparable among the different treatment groups except for serum calcium and creatinine. No significant (p>0.05) influence on activities of different enzymes like alanine transaminase and aspartate transaminase, except alkaline phosphatase in the serum of Vanaraja laying hens could be observed due to NLM supplementation. Heterophil/ Lymphocyte ratio showed significant difference (p<0.05) among the treatment groups and dietary supplementation of 1% NLM showed the lowest mean value. It is concluded that NLM up to 1% level replacing antibiotic powder (Oxytetracycline) in the diet of Vanaraja laying hens is ideal for maintaining optimum production performance, egg quality characteristics and serum biochemical profile.