Borassus aethiopum Mature Fruits' Dried Pulp Effect on Cobb 500 Broilers Growth Performance and Their Blood Plasma Cholesterol Contents

Objective: The study aimed to assess Borassus aethiopum mature fruits’ dried pulp effect on growth performance and blood plasma lipids profile of Cobb 500 broilers. Materials and Methods: In this study 150 day-old Cobb 500 chicks were used, under a common starter diet for 3 weeks. Thereafter, 2 groups of 70 unsexed birds each were set. Data were collected weekly during grower and finisher phase, within a group, the weights were recorded by noting down the sex. The treatments were T0 (control diet, without Borassus aethiopum) and T1 (20% of the yellow corn was substituted by Borassus aethiopum ripe fruits dried pulp). At week7, 3 roosters fed on T0, 3 others fed on T1, 3 hens fed on T0 and 3 hens fed on T1 were slaughtered and the blood was collected for blood cell count and blood plasma lipids quantification. Results: Chickens fed on T1 diet showed lower growth performance. For example, weekly weight gain was 686.74 g in the male birds from T0 (MT0), whereas, male from T1 (MT1) had 532.86 g, thus a loss of 22.41%. Similarly, weekly weight gain in hens fed on T0 diet (FT0) was 502.48 g, while those from T1 (FT1) gained 458.14 g, thus 8.82% less growth performance. Regarding blood cells count, there was no significant difference between diets and sex, but the differences in plasma lipids profile were significant. Total cholesterol significantly declined from 128±4.31 (T0) to 109.17±4.31 mg dL^–1 (T1) (-18.83 mg dL^–1, p = 0.0042). Likewise, HDL decreased by 15%, from 64.86±1.37 to 55.13±1.37 mg dL^–1 (-9.73 mg dL^–1, p<0.0001). The LDL cholesterol decreased non-significantly by 17.19% from 46.93±4.02 to 38.86±4.02 mg dL^–1 (-8.07 mg dL^–1, p = 0.166). Conclusion: Borassus aethiopum mature fruits’ dried pulp can be incorporated into the diet of Cobb-500 broilers. It has no adverse effect. Moreover, it reduces the blood plasma cholesterols’ concentrations.