F Bagherifard - Department of Animal Science, Astara Branch, Islamic Azad University, Astara, Iran
M Jafari - Department of Animal Science, Astara Branch, Islamic Azad University, Astara, Iran
O Esteghamat - Department of Animal Science, Astara Branch, Islamic Azad University, Astara, Iran
S Khojasteh - Department of Animal Science, Astara Branch, Islamic Azad University, Astara, Iran

This experiment was conducted to evaluate the effects of different levels of raw and alkali-treated of palm pulp (PP) on broilers performance. In this experiment 280 male broiler chicks were allocated in 7 treatments and 4 replication per each treatment. Experimental diets included in corn-soybean diet (control) and 3, 6 and 9% of raw and alkali-treated of PP. Body weight, feed conversion ratio (FCR) and feed intake were measured at 8, 21 and 42 days of age. Results 8-42 days of age showed that, there were significant differences between treatments in general terms of feed intake, daily weight gain and FCR (P<0.05). The highest feed intake was observed for 9% raw PP diet and the lowest was for control diet. As well as, the highest daily weight gain was observed for control diet and the lowest was for diet containing 9% alkali-treated PP. There was significant differences with diets containing PP (p<0.05) and control diet on FCR. Among treatments containing PP, diets containing 3% raw and 3 and 6% alkali-treated PP has FCR similar to the control diet. The result of this study indicated that, up to 3% raw and up to 6% alkali-treated PP can be used in broiler diets without negative effect on performance.

Broiler chicken, Palm pulp, Alkali-treated