Effect of Shrimp Meal on Growth Performance and Digestibility in Growing Broilers

Abstract

In order to use shrimp meal (SM) made from headless black tiger shrimp waste as a protein source for poultry diets, chemical composition of SM and growth performance, dry matter (DM) digestibility and nitrogen (N) retention in broilers given diets containing SM ranged from 0% to 16% were measured. Comparing with the data in the previous reports, SM used in the present study was rich in fiber and ash, hence poor in CP. Amino acid profiles revealed that SM had lower concentration of methionine+cysteine, lysine, isoleucine, leucine, tryptophane than soybean meal. The results of orthogonal polynomials revealed that body weight gain, feed intake, feed efficiency, DM digestibility and N retention decreased with increasing levels of SM and the results of ANOVA showed that, in most case, these parameters did not change significantly when SM level was at and below 8%. However, these parameters in birds given 8% SM diets did not differ from those in birds given 12% and 16% SM diets. Taking this into account, the safer level to add SM to a broiler diet seems to be 4%. Decreased body weight gain may be resulted from decreased feed intake, feed efficiency and DM digestibility. In conclusion, it is suggested that SM can be used as a protein source in a broiler diet as far as it is included at and below 4%.