ABSTRACT

The use of raw and dehulled velvet bean (Mucuna sloanei) meals as substitute for soy bean

meal in the diets of broiler chic was investigated. Three different experiments, designated as experiments 1, 2 and i were used for this study. In experiment 1, the proximate, gross energy and the anti - nutritional factors of the raw and dehulled Mucuna sloanei were chemically analyzed. In experiment 2, the dietary level of inclusion of raw Mucuna sloanei that will give good performance was investigated using 120 one week old broiler birds. They were randomly allotted into 4 dietary treatments having 3 replicates and 10 birds per replicate in a completely randomized design experiment. They were placed on four iso-energetic and iso-nitrogeneous diets. Diet 1 was soybean based while diets 2, 3 and 4 contained 5, 7.5 and 10% raw Mucuna sloanei respectively. The experiment lasted for 49 days. The following measurements were taken, growth performance, carcass quality (cut up parts, organ weights), haematological indices, blood chemistry and economics of the diets. The third experiment followed a similar pattern like experiment 2 except that soybean meal was substituted for by dehulled Mucuna sloanei. The proximate composition particularly the crude protein (28.13 and 27.42%) and gross enegy values (0.014 and 0.O13MJ/Kg) for raw and dehulled respectively showed that they are potential feed ingredients. The preence of anti- nutritional factors such as L- Dopa, tannin, hydrocyanide (IICN) and trypsin inhibitors were also confirmed. In experiment 2, there was significant difference ((P<.0.05)) for all the measurements taken except % mortality. It favoured the control diet in all parameters considered (final live weight, daily weight gain, % mortality, feed conversion ratio, % dressed weight, organ weight, blood chemistry, haeinatological parameters and economics of the diets) as opposed to diets containing the  test feed stuff. Experiments 3 (Dehulled Mucuna sloanei) results followed similar pattern like that of raw in that the control diet had the best performance in all the indices considered. From the above results, soybean could not be replaced by both raw and dehulled Mucuna Sloanei meals even at 5 % dietary level of inclusion. The need then to search for processing methods that can enhance Mucuiia sloane! potentials as livestock feed ingredient.