Investigating the Potential of Chasteberry as a Natural Phytobiotic Additive in Broilers

Abstract

To investigate the potential of the chasteberry (Vitex agnus-castus) leaf powder (CLP) as a new phytobiotic additive in broilers' diet, 600 one-day-old Cobb 500 broiler chicks were randomly distributed among five experimental groups with four replicates (30 birds/replicate). During the rearing period, one of the following additives was added to the diet of each experimental group: No additive as the control group, antibiotic (Erythromycin) at 0.025% of the diet, 0.3, 0.6, or 0.9% of CLP. The birds were kept under the same management and rearing conditions for 42 days. During the rearing period, the birds were fed starter, grower, and finisher diets from 1-12, 13-24, and 25-42 days of age, respectively. Performance traits, including feed intake (FI), body weight gain (BWG), and feed conversion ratio (FCR), were measured for the entire period (d 1-42) of the study. Also, the status of the immune system, some ileal bacterial count, and jejunum morphology were evaluated. The findings indicated that dietary inclusion of different levels of CLP had detrimental effects on broiler performance, such that FI and BWG decreased while FCR increased (P<0.05). No significant difference was observed between the control and CLP groups in view of Ig M, Ig Y, and Total Ig titers against SRBC (P>0.05). Dietary inclusion of 0.3 % CLP decreased ileal E. coli count compared to the control group (P<0.05). Jejunum morphology (villus height, crypt depth, villus height/crypt depth ratio) was not influenced by experimental treatments (P>0.05). In conclusion, dietary supplementation with 0.3, 0.6, and 0.9 % CLP had no significant effect on immunity and jejunum morphology but negatively influenced broilers' performance traits and thus could not be recommended as a phytobiotic additive. Investigation of the effects of lower levels of CLP is recommended for future studies.