Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

1 Assistant Professor, Department of Animal Science, Faculty of Agriculture, Shiraz University, Iran

2 M.Sc. Graduated Student, Department of Animal Science, Faculty of Agriculture, Shiraz University, Iran

3 Associate Professor, Department of Animal Science, Faculty of Agriculture, Shiraz University, Iran

Abstract

In order to investigate antioxidant and antimicrobial effects of pomegranate peel powder (PPP), this research was conducted as completely randomized design arranged in a 2 × 2 factorial experiment using pomegranate peel powder (0 and 2 percent) and soybean oil (SO, zero and six percent in growing period; zero and eight percent in finishing period). One hundred and sixty 11-day-old Ross 308 broiler chickens assigned to four treatments of four replicate each. The results showed that PPP improved the antibody titer in 39-day broilers, increased fat digestibility, improved lactobacillus and decreased E coli micro flora in ileum and cecum significantly (P ≤ 0.05). The SO decreased DM digestibility and lactobacillus micro flora and E coli in ileum and cecum (P ≤ 0.05). As a conclusion adding PPP to the fat containing diets in comparison to control diets; without PPE and SO, improved antibody titer, beneficial gastric micro flora in ileum and cecum and had not any deleterious effect on overall broiler performance.

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