Performance of Broiler Chickens Fed Graded Dietary Levels of Rice Milling Residue as a Fibre Source

An experiment was conducted to evaluate the growth performance of broilers fed dietary levels of rice milling residue (RMR) as a replacement of wheat offal (WO), as a fibre source in broiler diet. Three hundred (300) day old chicks were used for the experiment in a completely randomized design (CRD) for eight (8) weeks. The birds were randomly allotted to five (5) dietary treatments of sixty (60) chicks and replicated three (3) times with twenty (20) chicks per replicate. Five (5) treatment diets were formulated in which rice milling residue (RMR) was included to replace wheat offal (WO) at the levels of 0, 25, 50, 75 and 100% representing T1, T2, T3, T4 and T5 respectively. The result of the growth performance showed that, the average daily feed intake (ADFI), average daily weight gained (ADWG) were not significantly different (P>0.05) across treatment groups except feed conversion ratio (FCR). Birds fed T1, T2, T3 and T5 recorded Superior FCR. ADWG ranged from 31.31 g (T1) to 32.82 (T3). Birds on T3 diet recorded higher feed intake of 130.15 g while the least was observed in T1 (116.82 g). It was concluded that rice milling residue (RMR) can completely replace wheat offal without any detrimental effect on growth performance of broilers chickens.