Evaluation of the effects of different levels of Pennyroyal essential oil and probiotic containing Bacillus coagulens on performance, carcass characteristics, and meat quality of broiler chickens

This experiment was conducted to study the effect of different levels of pennyroyal essential oil and probiotic (Bacillus coagulans) on performance, carcass characteristics, and meat quality of broiler chickens. In this experiment 240 one day-old Ross 308 broilers were used in a completely randomized design with 3×2 factorial arrangements with three levels of pennyroyal essential oil (zero, 100 and 200 mg/kg) and two levels of probiotic (zero and 200 mg/kg) with 4 replications and 10 chicks per replicate. The interaction effeacts of pennyroyal essential oil and probiotic showed that body weight gains and feed conversion ratio in chickens fed with diet containing probiotic compared to other treatment except chickens fed with diet containing 100 mg of pennyroyal essential oil were significantly higher and lower respectively (p < 0.05). The main effect and interactions of pennyroyal essential oil and probiotic on feed intake were not significant. The interaction effects on the relative weight of breast were significant and the highest relative weight of breast was for chickens fed with diet containing probiotic. In addition, the lowest malondialdehyde and cooking loss values and the highest water holding capacity and yellowness values were for chickens fed with diet containing 100 mg of pennyroyal essential oil plus probiotic. In conclusion, inclusion of pennyroyal essential oil (100 mg/kg) plus probiotic into the diet of broiler chicken without affecting the performance, improved the meat quality.