Egg lay and quality characteristics of layer chickens fed molasses-flavoured cassava peel meal and sheanut cake based diets

Abstract

Commercial rearing of laying hens is on the increase due to the universal and nutritional recognition gained by egg as a major source of protein with less health hazards compared to other livestock products. This study evaluated the effect of molasses-flavoured cassava peels (MFSCP) and shaenut cake (MFSNC) meal-based diets on the egg lay and quality characteristics of layer chickens. The study had five treatments inclusions as follows: Control, 10% MFSCP, 20% MFSCP, 10% MFSNC and 20% MFSNC. The egg laying assessment results were significant for all the parameters measured. The shell weight, shell ratio and egg length were affected by the treatments among all other external egg quality parameters that were assessed. This result also shows that diets significantly influenced certain internal quality characteristics including albumen weight, yolk weight, albumen height, yolk height, Haugh unit, yolk index and yolk ratio. However, the values obtained in this study all fall within the minimum and maximum quality characteristic ranges for Isa brown breeds of layer chickens. It could therefore mean that all the treatment diets had no detrimental effect on the internal egg quality parameters measured in this study.