Abstract:
25A CHICKPEAS, MUNG BEANS AND PIGEONPEAS FOR BROILERS H.M. MILLER , B. LODEBO and J.H.G. HOLMES The production of chickpeas, mung beans and pigeonpeas is increasing rapidly both locally and overseas, mainly for human consumption. A stockfeed market for these grains would permit utilisation of reject and excess production, thus stabilising the industry while providing a valuable protein and energy source. To date the chicken meat industry has been reluctant to use these products in broiler diets due to the suspected presence of antinutritional factors (ANF) and lack of information about possible inclusion levels of untreated grains. Mung beans and kabuli chickpeas were used in experiment 1, and desi chickpeas and pigeonpeas were used in experiment 2. In both experiments the grains were each incrementally incorporated into diets to m-urn inclusion levels of 50%, 50%, 20% and 16% respectively. Desi chickpeas and pigeonpeas had low apparent metabolisable energy content preventing them from being included at higher levels. All diets were formulated to contain 12.0 MJ ME/kg, 1.1% lysine and to meet other nutrient requirements (ARC, 1975). Each diet was fed to 4 replicates of 8 male chicks from the 5th to the 28th day of age. Ixvels of trypsin inhibitor (TI), chymotrypsin inhibitor (CTI), lectins and tannins were determined for each of the grain legumes. TABLE 1 Performance of male broilers fed chickpeas, mung beans or pigeonpeas between 5 and 28 days of age, ANF levels of the diets. Numbers with different superscripts are significantly different. Numbers in italics have been calculated from concentration of ANF in the ingredients. Pigeonpeas and desi chickpeas did not depress performance compared to the control at the levels fed. For chicks fed on mung beans and kabuli chickpeas performance declined as inclusion level increased resulting in lower liveweight gain (p<O.OOl) and higher feed conversion ratio (p<O.OOl). Birds fed kabuli chickpeas had heavier pancreas weights. (p<O.OOl) These results indicate the detrimental effect of feeding these gram legumes presumably due to their ANF content. This is in contrast to the findings of Johnson and Eason (1990). However they did not report their ANF levels which can vary markedly between batches of the same legume (Batterham and Saini, 1990). ARC (1975) Nutrient Requirements of Poultry. JOHNSON R J. and EASON P.J. (1990). Aust.Poult.Sci.Symp., Uni. of Sydney, Sydney 9699 BAITERHAM E. and SAINI H. (1990). Pig Ind. Seminar, N. Coast Ag.Inst. Wollongbar, NSW 18-22. School of Agriculture and Forestry, University of Melbourne, Parkville 3052