Feeding Value of Single Cell Protein Produced from Date Palm (Phoenix dactylifera) Fruits for Broiler Chickens

Saudi Arabia produces about 0.5 million tons and about 130,000 tons of poultry meat and eggs respectively per year and depends mainly on imported protein concentrate for feeding these birds. Therefore, it is important to produce poultry feed using locally available materials. The objective of this research was to find the feed value of the microbial protein, produced from date waste to broiler chickens. Experiment was conducted using different levels of single cell protein yeast, Saccharomyces cerevisiae, (0, 5, 10 and 15 %) in the diets of broiler chickens. Diets were formulated to feed 120 day old broilers. The chicks were randomly distributed in to 12 battery pens each contained 10 chicks. The dietary treatments were assigned to the cages in such a way that each dietary treatment was assigned to 3 battery pens (replicates). Results of the chemical analysis showed that level of the yeast proteinwas 51.88 %. This protein was found to be rich in Lysine (1.02 %). Methionine level of the protein was not as high as the Lysine (0.27 %). Level of fat in the yeast was only 6.41 %; however, its content from Oleic acid was 43.2 %. Linoleic and Linolenic levels were 0.85 and 0.14 %, respectively. Performance of the birds revealed no significant differences(P>0.05) between the control birds and birds on 5 % level of the yeast in terms of final body weight and final cumulative feed conversion .However there was a clear indication that addition of 15 % single cell protein may be harmful to the birds. It was concluded that adding 5 % single cell protein, produced from Date Palm fruit waste to the broilers, produce no adverse effect to the performance of the birds and can be included in their diet.