Effect of Thyme Essential Oil (Origanum Vulgare L.) Supplementation on Performance of Japanese Quail Exposed to Experimental Aflatoxicosis

Year 2005, Volume: 19 Issue: 36, 1 - 6, 25.08.2005

Sinan Sefa Parlat Alp Önder Yıldız Yusuf Cufadar Osman Olgun

Abstract

Thyme essential oil (TEO) was evaluated for its ability to reduce the deleterious effects of AF in Japanese quail. It was incorporated into the diets containing 2.5 mg/kg total AF. In the present study, 120 10-d-old Japanese quail were randomly distributed into four experimental groups (30 birds per group) and fed the following diets for 35 days: I) Control (C): bazal diet; II) C+2.5 mg/kg AF; III) C+0.1% TEO; IV) C+2.5 mg/kg AF+1% TEO of diet. Each treatment consisted of 10 repli-cates of 3 quail. Performance parameters were determined weekly. Feed were given as ad libitum. Results showed that by the end of the trial, feeding alone AF-containing significantly decreased body weight gain and feed consumption during the exper-iment. The addition of TEO to an AF-containing diet significantly reduced the deleterious effects of AF on body weight gain and feed consumption. Body weight gain was reduced by 16.3% in quail consuming the AF diet without TEO, but increased by 1.7% for quail consuming the AF plus TEO diet. Similarly, feed consumption was reduced 17.3% in birds consuming the AF diet without TEO, but by only 2% for birds consuming the AF plus TEO diet. Feeding TEO alone caused significant im-proved in feed conversion ratio during the experiment compared with the other groups. These results suggest-ed that TEO effectively diminished the detrimental effects of AF on performance in this study.

Keywords

Aflatoxin, performance, quail, thyme essential oil