Influence of hot red pepper (capsicum frutescens l.) as a diet supplement for the growth of native chicken (Gallus gallus domesticus)

Abstract

Native chicken production is a trend in many rural areas in the Philippines because of the highly adaptable conditions with less food, poor shelter, diseases, and sudden changes in weather patterns which generally stress the exotic varieties. Thirty-six native chickens were used in the experiment, randomly allocated to 4 treatments, and replicated three times with nine native chickens for each treatment. The treatments were as follows: T₀ (control) was fed a diet containing 50 grams of commercial feed without hot red pepper as a control diet, T₁ – 50 grams of commercial meals + 0.50 grams of hot red pepper, T₂ – 50 grams of commercial feeds + 0.75 grams of hot red pepper and T₃ – 50 grams commercial feeds + 1 gram of hot red pepper. Results showed that supplementation of hot red pepper had no difference (P > 0.05) between the starter and finisher in cumulative feed consumption and cumulative feed conversion ratio on starter, grower, and finisher. However, from the first week to the ninth week, weekly weight gain has a significant difference (P > 0.05). Furthermore, native chicken feeds with 0.50 g. of hot red pepper (Capsicum frutescens L.) gained the highest percentage of weight and treatments. Therefore different levels of application of hot red pepper affect the diet performance of the native chicken. Supplementing red hot pepper for the growth of native chicken also resulted in more than 50% return on investment.