Chemical composition and nutritional value of boiled Christmas bush fruit (Alchornea cordifolia) meal fed to starter broiler chickens

A study was conducted to determine the chemical composition and nutritive value of boiled Christmas bush (Alchornea cordifolia) for starter broiler chickens. Dried fruits (Capsules + seed) were 30 minutes, sundried ground into meal. The meal analyzed proximate anti-nutritional factors incorporated diet at 0%, 15%, 20% 25% respectively. total 120 day old Marshall Strain chicks divided 12 pens each containing 10 birds. Three randomly assigned experimental diet. dried fruit contained 19.9% crude protein 4.7 mg/100 phytic acids which is an improvement when compared with raw fruits. Increase in inclusion level caused a progressive reduction (p < 0.05) final weight gain feed intake Birds on 15 BCBF had similar (p>0.05) conversion ration ratio birds control cost per Kg mortality not significantly different all treatments. Apart from Haemoglobin serum phosphate, other biochemical indices checked statistically among treatment groups. It concluded that boiling decreased improved but could improve performance