The present study aimed to investigate the effect of dietary pomegranate peel powder (PPP) and probiotic bacteria (PB) on the growth rate, carcass traits, blood serum metabolites, and meat quality of Ross broiler chickens during 1-5 weeks of age. A total of 480 unsexed Ross broiler chicks 7-days old with the beginning bodyweight of 110.58 ± 0.17 g were employed in a complete randomized purpose trail with eight groups; 60 chicks in six replicates (8 × 6 × 10). The dietary treatments were as follows: NC: negative group (without additives) group one; PC: positive control (main diet + 0.5 g Colostin antibiotic/kg feed); PPP 3-5: basal diet + 2, 3, 4 g pomegranate peel powder/kg diet and PPP 6-8: basal diet + 2, 3, 4 g pomegranate peel powder + 1 cm3 probiotic (Bacillus toyonensis (BT)/kg diet, respectively. The results showed that live body weight (LBW) at five weeks and body weight gain (BWG) during 1-5 weeks of age were affected by adding PPP in the ration and the good grads of PPP were 2 and 4 g PPP without PB/kg diet compared to NC and PC, respectively. Otherwise, daily feed conception (DFC) and feed conversion ratio (FCR) were not affected by adding the different grads of PPP with or without PB, except the first period of DFC (1-3 weeks of old) were affected. Results showed a significant effect on all carcass characteristics studied, except gizzard and abdominal fat ratio were not influenced by the treatment used. Likewise, the addition of PPP to broiler chicken diets has a good effect on almost the blood serum metabolites, immunological parameters and quality of meat studied. In the end, the outcome of this study concluded that the addition of PPP to broiler diets has a good effect on the growth rate, blood serum metabolites, immunological parameters and the quality of meat as well as the health aspects.
Keywords: Pomegranate peel powder; antioxidant status; broilers; growth; probiotic.