Performance and bioeconomics of feeding broilers at different periods of the day

Abstract

An experiment was conducted to investigate the growth response and bio-economics of feeding broiler chickens on different feeding regimes at finishing phase. Sixty 4-week old broiler chickens were randomly divided into three dietary treatments with two replicates of 10 birds each in a completely randomized design. The birds were fed at different times of the day and each treatment group was subjected to one of the three feeding regimens: morning (6:00am) and evening (7:00pm) feeders (T1), day feeders (T2) and night feeders (T3). The results indicated that birds which had access to feed during the day significantly (P<0.05) consumed more feed with concomitant increase in cost of feed compared with those on the other treatments. There was non-significant (P>0.05) difference in the average daily body weight gain, feed conversion ratio, protein efficiency ratio, feed cost per kg gain, revenue per bird. Total feed and cost of feed consumed was encouraging in T1 and T3 unlike T2 which incurred more cost on feeding. This study, therefore, recommends the feeding of broiler chickens using either night or day and evening feeding regime program at 4 weeks aged finishing phase.