Abstract:
This study was conducted to evaluate the effect of hydroponic barley fodder supplementation
on growth performance and carcass characteristics of Cobb 500 broilers. Cobb 500 unsexed
day-old chicks were purchased from Samson Wossen (SW) poultry farm located in Dera town,
Oromia Region. Then, an accustomed proper feeding and brooding have been given to the
chicks for up to three weeks of age. After three weeks, 144 three-week-old birds were
randomly assigned to four treatments and replicated three times with 12 chicks per
replication in a completely randomized design. Treatments were arranged as follows; T1:
Home formulated Broiler diet (control group), T2: Home formulated Broiler diet +3.5%
hydroponic barley fodder, T3: Home formulated Broiler diet +7% hydroponic barley fodder,
and T4: Home formulated Broiler diet +10.5% hydroponic barley fodder. To achieve the
objective of the current study, data on initial body weight of chicks, daily feed intake, daily
weight gain, feed conversion ratio and final weight were recorded to estimate the hydroponic
barley fodder effect on growth performance of broilers and data on weight of carcass
components, carcass pH, water holding capacity and cooking loss were recorded at the end of
the feed trial to estimate the effect of hydroponic barley fodder on yield and quality of broiler
carcass. The result of the current study revealed that, increasing the level of hydroponic
barley fodder was associated with an improvement of both growth performance parameters
and weight of carcass components. Higher average daily feed intake (112.72 g/bird), daily
body weight gain (56.37 g/bird) were obtained from T4 (home formulated feed +10.5% HBF).
However, fodder had no significant (>0.05) effect on the mortality rate of broiler chickens.
Similarly, supplementing hydroponic fodder to the broilers did not significantly (>0.05)
impact the carcass quality of chicks. Economically, the highest net return was obtained from
birds fed on T4 (Home formulated Broiler diet +10.5% hydroponic barley fodder).
In conclusion, supplementing hydroponic barley fodder up to 10.5% improves carcass
characteristics and result higher net income compared to other treatments. The current study
recommended that further investigation like inclusion and substitution trial should be
conducted to determine whether hydroponic barley fodder can replace expensive poultry
ration ingredients.