Abstract:
The need for poultry feed is rising with increase of human population and consequently increasing broiler meat consumption. Industrial waste causes significant environmental pollution which causes lot of health issues as well as deterioration of ecosystem. Significant amounts of date pits are produced every year after industrial and household production of date fruit. By using date pit powder in the broiler diet, not only the industrial waste can be minimized, but also environmental pollution can be reduced. This study was carried out to examine the effect of date pit powder on growth performance of broilers, carcass characteristics, meat quality and processing parameters. At first, about 700, oneday-
old chicks were raised for three weeks on basal diet under ad libitum conditions. About 160 almost equal-weight birds were divided into four treatments (D0, D1, D2, and D3 at 0%, 0.25%, 0.5%, and 1% date pit powder) after three weeks. Each treatment had 40 birds, which were divided into 5 replicates, each of which had 8 chicks. The growth performance results revealed that when compared to the control, D3 showed significant feed intake (FI) in 5th week. Similarly, live bird weight (LBW) of D1, D2 and D3 increased significantly than control in 4th week. Body weight gain (BWG) results revealed that D1 and D2, when compared to the control, showed significant increase
in 4th week. Finally, feed conversion ratio (FCR) of D1 & D2 increased significantly than control in 5th week. After slaughtering the treated chicks, it was revealed that the weight percentages of the dressed bird, carcass, breast, thigh, drumstick, drumette, gizzard, niblet, heart, liver, feathers, feet, and body fats were non-significant. The supplementation had no effect on the meat samples' pH, ash, moisture content (MC), expressible moisture (EM), water holding capacity (WHC), cook loss (CL), drip loss (DL), and thaw loss (TL) as compared to control meat samples. The results of the lightness (L* values), redness (a* values), and yellowness (b* values) on the instrument color evaluation were also non- significant statistically when DPP supplementation was used. However, compared to raw meat, the cooked meat samples a* values, b* values, and L* values all significantly decreased. Finally, date pit powder supplementation had no effect on any of the following sensory qualities: hardness, springiness, aroma, texture, juiciness, color, taste, or overall consumer acceptability. However, when compared to raw samples, these sensory qualities of cooked samples increased significantly in terms of aroma, hardness, and color, while texture, springiness, but juiciness decreased noticeably. In conclusion, date pit powder supplementation in the broiler diet did not negatively affect the growth performance of the broiler chickens or the quality of chicken meat, hence can be added in broiler feed to reduce environmental impact of date pit waste.