Dietary inclusion of Ashwagandha (Withania somnifera) root powder on growth performance and metabolizability in broilers

A total of 300, one day-old commercial broiler chicks were procured and randomly distributed into 30 subgroups means six dietary treatments with five replicates per treatment and each replicate has ten birds. Feeding trial was conducted for 42 days. The control group (T1) was offered maize- soybean meal based diet which was formulated as per BIS (2007) [7] to fulfill the metabolizable energy (ME) and crude protein requirements of broilers. The first group was kept as a control (T1) and given the basal diet without antibiotic while second (T2) basal diet with antibiotic, third (T3), fourth (T4), fifth (T5) and sixth (T6) groups were supplemented with Ashwagandha root powder @ 0.25, 0.5, 0.75 and 1%, respectively in the diet. Feed intake (g/bird) and body weight gain (g/b) showed significant (P