Effects of Dietary Supplementation with Yellow Meal Worm Larvae (Tenebrio molitor) on Performance of Broiler Chicken

Abstract/Overview

A 6-week feeding trial was conducted to investigate the effects of dietary supplementation with Yellow Meal Worm larvae (YMWL) on growth performance and carcass characteristics of broiler chicken. The larvae was processed and included in diets at different levels 0%YMWL (control), 2.5%YMWL, 5%YMWL and 7.5%YMWL. The diets were formulated to be iso-nitrogenous and iso-caloric in mash form for the starter and finisher phases. 160-day-old cobb-500 broiler chicks were randomly allocated to the four diets and replicated four times with ten birds each per replicate in a completely randomized design. The average daily feed intake was similar across all the treatments (p>0.05). Birds fed on 5%YMWL had a significantly higher body weight gain than other treatment diets for the entire feeding phase of 42 days. The feed conversion ratio (FCR) improved at 5%YMWL inclusion compared with the control (0%YMWL) diet for the entire feeding phase (p