Nutritive and replacement value of hungry rice ‘‘Acha’’ ( Digitaria exilis ) grain for maize grain in broiler starter chicks

The hungry rice grains (HG) were determined for nutrients and anti nutrients and evaluated for growth performance. Five dietary diets were formulated with AG replacing maize at 0, 25, 50, 75 and 100 %. A total of 150 7days-old broiler chicks (Abor-Acre) were randomly allotted to five treatments of 30 birds each, replicated thrice (10 birds each) in a completely randomized design for 28 days. The results of the proximate composition of hungry rice grains showed 87.00% dry matter, 12.00 % crude protein, 6.49% ether extracts, 8.57% crude fibre, 5.70% ash, 67.24% nitrogen free extracts and gross energy of 3556.06 Kcal/kg. The anti- nutrient values of acha grains contained 0.18 mg/100g of tannin, 1.03 mg/100g of phytate, 0.90 mg/100g of oxalate and 0.05mg/100g of cyanide. The mineral element of acha grains showed the following trend (mg/100g) K (215.82) 0.05) to those on 75% (1948.26g) and 0% (1972.90g). The feed: gain of birds on 25 % (1.97) HG was superior (P<0.05) compared with those of other diets. KEY WORDS : Nutrients, Metabolites, Performance, Acha Grains, Broiler Chicks