ABSTRACT

A 56-day feeding trial involving sixty (60) 8 weeks old starter turkey birds was conducted to evaluate the perfonnance and economics of turkey poults fed diets containing varying levels of toasted bambara groundnut offal (TBGO) at the grower phase. The poults were assigned to five (5) dietary treatment groups of twelve (12) birds per treatment with four (4) birds per replicate in a completely randomized design. The birds were fed diets containing varying levels of TBGO at 0%, 7.5%, 15%, 22.5% and 30%, designated as diet T1, T>, Ts, T; and T; respectively. Diet T; was the control diet The birds were weighed at the beginning of the experiment and weekly thereafter. Experimental diet and water were provided ad libitum. The parameters measured include growth perfonnance and economics of production. The result of the experiment showed that the final live weight, total weight gain and average daily weight gain of turkeys fed diet T% (2816.67g; 1875.33g; 33.48g) and diet T4 (2677.67y;, 1705.83g; 30.45g) were significantly (p<0.05) higher than turkeys fed diets T; (2452.23g; 1488. 70g; 26.57g), T2 (2499.83g; 1521.36g; 27.15g) and T; (2190.70g; 1345.46g; 24.0lg). The feed conversion ratio (FCR) of turkeys fed diet Ts (5.41) was significantly (p> (6.68) and T; (6.82) but had similar (p>0.05) FCR value to birds fed diet T, (5.95). There were no significant (p>0.05) differences in mortality, average daily feed intake and cost of feed consumed. However, the cost of a kilogramme of feed ranged from N184.12 in diets Ts and T; to N185.62 in diets T;. The turkeys fed T± and T, recorded significantly (p<0.05) lower cost per kg weight gain (N1257.91; NI 163.02 ) and best returns in revenue (N4015.00; N4225.00) and gross margin (N3830.51; N4040.88) compared to turkey fed diets T, T>, and T;. The result obtained in this study showed that TBGO could be incorporated in grower turkey diets up to 30% level without adversely affecting performance of turkeys.