Growth performance, nutrient digestibility, carcass and economic characteristics of turkey poults fed millet-based diets as a replacement for maize

Abstract

A nine (9) weeks feeding trial was conducted on seventy two (72) day-old Indigenous turkey poults raised on deep litter to determine their growth performance, carcass and economic characteristics when fed three dietary treatments (T1, T2, and T3) containing 0 %, 25 % and 50 % replacement of maize with millet respectively. The birds were divided into three replicates of 8 birds per replicate; making a total of 24 birds per treatment. At the end of the 8th week, 4 birds per replicate were transferred to specially-designed metabolism cages for a digestibility study involving the collection of faecal droppings; while at the end of the 9th week of the experiments, two birds per replicate were randomly selected and slaughtered to determine their carcass characteristics. Turkey poults fed millet at 25 % replacement showed significantly (p<0.05) higher body weight gain, lower cost of feed per kg live weight gain and higher revenue generated per bird; but there were no significant (p>0.05) differences in the performance of birds on 0 % and 50 % replacements for those parameters. Also, there were no significant (p>0.05) differences in feed intake and mortality across the treatments. Similarly, there were no significant (p>0.05) differences in nutrient digestbilities and carcass characteristics of the birds among the various dietary treatments. Therefore, it can be concluded that millet can be used to replace maize up to 50 % in the diets of turkey poults at the starter phase with no detrimental effects on their performance.