The potential of two vegetable-carried blood meals as protein sources in African catfish (<i>Clarias gariepinus</i>, Burchell) juvenile diets

The study was designed to determine the growth response of African catfish (Clarias gariepinus) juveniles on diets with two vegetable-carried blood meals (brewers’ dried grains with blood meal (BB) and rumen contents with blood meal (RB)) as protein sources and alternatives to imported commercial fish feed (CatCo?). Diets, with BB and RB included at 10%, formulated to supply 45% crude protein and 4,300 Kcal digestible energy/kg in similarity with CatCo?, were used in a 49-day trial in plastic tanks (L × B × H: 53 cm × 37 cm × 29 cm;capacity 50 liters). Juveniles were evaluated in terms of mean final body weight (MFBW), mean weight gain (MWG), average daily gain (ADG), specific growth rate (SGR), average daily feed intake (ADFI), feed conversion ratio (FCR), protein efficiency ratio (PER), feed cost/g gain (FCGA), and mortality (as % survival). CatCo? was superior (P ? was similar (P < 0.05) to BB in PER but inferior in FCGA (0.46 vs. 0.36 Naira/g gain;1 US$ = N150). RB was similar (P < 0.05) to BB in PER but least economical in FCGA (0.51 Naira/g gain). The study demonstrated the potential of vegetable-carried blood meals from brewers’ dried grains and dewatered rumen contents as alternatives for use as feed for African catfish especially juveniles.

Utilization of sun-dried maize offal with blood meal in diets for broiler chickens

Sun-dried blend of maize offal and blood (SDMBM) was analyzed and its effect on the per- formance of broiler chickens (Anak-2000 strain) evaluated. Fresh blood prevented from coagu- lation, mixed with maize offal, was sun-dried, ground, mixed again with blood and ground into a meal after drying again. The crude protein, fat, fibre, ash, ADF and gross energy contents of SDMBM were, 362.0, 45.5, 31.8, 69.3, 52.3 g/kg DM and 4.245 kcal/g, respectively. It was ade- quate in all essential amino acids for growing broiler chickens except methionine. Eighty 14- day-old commercial broiler chicks were ran- domly allocated to four dietary treatments (fed ad libitum;four replicates each) consisting the control diet (0 g SDMBM/kg diet), which con- tained fishmeal, groundnut cake and soybean meal, and three other diets (50, 100 and 150 g SDMBM/kg diet). In a feeding trial, the starter (14 to 35 d) and finisher (35 to 49 d) dietary treat- ments did not have significant impact (P > 0.05) on body weight gain, efficiency of feed conver- sion, mortality and final body weights. The con- trol diet was inferior (P < 0.05) to 50, 100 and 150 g SDMBM/kg diets for feed cost per unit weight gain in the starter phase, 100 g SDMBM/kg diet in the finisher phase, and 100 and 150 g SDMBM/ kg diets for the whole period (14 to 49 d). Overall, the 100 and 150 g superior (P < 0.05) to the con- trol diet in cost of production per unit weight gain and all the SDMBM diets greater than con- trol in economic benefit per unit weight gain. Results suggest that dietary SDMBM up to 150 g/kg diet has a positive effect on broiler per- formance and can totally replace more expen- sive fishmeal.