The effect of adding turmeric and artemisia herba powder to ration on productive performance of white laying hens

Abstract

The study was aimed to improve the productive performance of white laying hens, using two types of medicinal herbs, including turmeric and Artemisia Herba. In the experiment 63 laying hens (white shevar) were used at an age of 24 weeks, hens were divided randomly in to three treatment 21 hens pre treatment with 3 replicate of 7 hens per replicate. A standard ration was used without any addition, which was considered as the control treatment (T1), the basic ration, plus turmeric powder (0.5%) (T2), while the treatment (T3) represented the basic ration plus Artemisia Herba powder by 0.5%. The study included the measurements of egg production, egg weight, feed consumption, feed conversion ratio and egg mass. The results showed a significant improvement (P<0.05) in the characteristics of egg production ratio, feed conversion ratio and egg mass for the treatment with the addition of Artemisia Herba flower (T3) compared with other treatments, and significant decrease (P<0.05) in the amount of feed consumed (T2, T3) as compared with the control treatment (T1), while the results did not show any significant differences to addition of turmeric to the ration (T2) in the productive performance as compared to the control treatment. It was concluded from that the addition of Artemisia Herba to the ration resulted in a significant improvement in most of the productive performance of laying hens as compared to other treatments.