Effect of Dried Medicinal Crops on the Performance and Carcase Flavour of Broilers

I.M. Dahal and M.T. Farran

The present study was planed to evaluate the effect of adding 2% of Mint, Thyme and Cardamom to the broiler finisher diet for 0, 6, 12 and 18 days before slaughter at 42 days old on the performance, carcase yield and meat flavouring using the two-way ANOVA method for means analysis. The final results showed that there was no significant negative affect for the dried medicinal crops on the performance and carcase traits. On the other hand a significant (p<0.01) positive flavour was indicated for the medicinal crop fed broilers compared to the control, when a cooked samples from breast were evaluated though a taste panel test using a Triangle test method. Serum biochemistry parameters did not differ significantly between treatment groups. Low Density Lipoprotein (LDL) means were numerically 17.8 and 4.5% low in cardamom and thyme fed broiler serum and the High Density Lipoprotein (HDL) means were 1.7, 11.2 and 17.4% high in cardamom, mint and thyme crop fed broiler serum compared with the control respectively.