Effect of feeding antibiotic-free rations supplemented with some selected herbals oil mixture on vaccinated and non-vaccinated female broilers performance, hematological profile and antibody titer

Abstract EN

The effect of feeding antibiotics-free ration supplemented with Pimpinella anisum, Nigella sativa and Thymus vulgaris oil mixture on vaccinated and non-vaccinated female broilers was studied.

An experiment of 4 dietary treatments of 4 replicates x 25 chicks each was conducted on Lohman female broilers from 1 to 42 days of age.

Dietary treatments consisted of the same starter and finisher antibiotic-free rations, supplemented or not with 0.2% oils mixture of Pimpinella anisum, Nigella sativa and Thymus vulgaris (1:1:1) throughout the experiment period.

The statistical findings of this study proved that, the addition of oil mixture to antibiotics-free ration improved significantly live body weight, body weight gain and feed conversion ratio of un-vaccinated and vaccinated female broilers at 21- and 42- days of age.

Moreover, oil mixture improved (P< 0.5) antibody titer of vaccinated female broilers at 21-days of age against ND, IBD and IB.

Meanwhile, at 21-days of age the addition of oil mixture to the vaccinated female broilers didn’t reflect an additional significant improvement in antibody titer against studied diseases.

But addition of oil mixture to un-vaccinated female broilers ration improved (P<0.05) antibody titer against ND, IB and IBD compared with unvaccinated female broiler fed the un-supplemented ration.

The present study showed that at 21-days of age, addition of oil mixture to vaccinated female broilers increased significantly WBCs, heterophils and lymphocytes, while, addition of oil mixture to unvaccinated female broilers antibiotics-free ration increased significantly Hct and thrombocytes counts compared with other dietary treatments.

On the other hand, at 42-days of age vaccinated female broilers fed antibiotics-free ration recorded the highest (P<0.05) WBCs and Hct counts compared with other dietary treatments.

Meanwhile, the use of oil mixture of PA, NS and NS did not resulted significantly in any positive effects on other measured parameters.