SUPPLEMENTATION OF WITHANIA SOMNIFERA L.ROOTS AND PRODUCTIVE PERFORMANCE OF HEAT STRESSED JAPANESE QUAIL | ||
| The Iraqi Journal of Agricultural Science | ||
| Article 1, Volume 45, Issue 3, April 2014, Pages 322-327 | ||
| Authors | ||
| S. K. Ahmed; D. K. Ibrahim; S. M. Hussain | ||
| Abstract | ||
| An experiment was conducted to assess the anti-stress efficacy of Withania somnifera root on prod-uctive performance of Japanese quail hens reared under high environmental temperature (27-37-27ºC). Three hundred Japanese quail hens six weeks old were randomly distributed into five treat-ments: T0= control, T1 and T2=quails supplemented orally with 50, 100 mg/kg/day Withania somnifera root ethanolic extract respectively, while T3 and T4 = quails received 1 and 2 g/kg diet Withania somnifera root powder respectively. The productive characteristics included: feed consumption, body weight gain and feed conversion ratio, in addition to total mortality percentage. Results showed that feed consumption increased significantly (p≤0.01) in quails received 1g/kg root powder (T3) in comparison with all other treatments (T0, T1,T2 and T4) whereas T2 group was the lowest in this character. On the other hand, supplemented quails with 100mg/kg ethanolic extract (T2) resulted in significant (p≤0.05) increasing in body weight gain as compared with control group (T0), yet, all treated groups didn’t differ significantly among each others. The best (p≤0.05) feed conversion ratio was obtained when the quails supplemented with root ethanolic extract (T1andT2) or with 2g/kg diet of root powder (T4) in comparison with control. Withania somnifera root as ethanolic extract or powder resulted in significant (p≤0.05) reduction in mortality percentage in comparison with untreated group. | ||
| Keywords | ||
| heat stress; Japanese quail; adaptogenic efficacy | ||
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