Effect of feeding black soldier fly (hermetia illucens) larvae meal on the haematological, serum biochemical, and meat quality of local village chickens

An abstract of the research paper presented to the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Universiti Malaysia Kelantan, in partial requirement of the course DVT 5504 – Research Project. Nowadays, one factor contributing to the rise in poultry production expenses and the subsequent increase in chicken prices is the rise in the price of chicken feed. Therefore, finding a substitute for poultry feedstuff due to this circumstance is crucial. This research aimed to determine the effect of feeding local village chicken meals consisting of Black Soldier Fly Larvae (BSFL) on the meat quality, haematological and biochemical profiles of the local village chicken. The chickens were divided into 2 groups: the treatment group (group A) and the control group (Group B). The treatment group was fed with a combination of 60% BSFL and 40% commercial feed meanwhile, the control group was fed with 100% commercial feed. The chickens were slaughtered for meat quality and blood analysis at 35 days of age. For meat quality analysis, parameters such as pH, cooking loss, and drip loss were evaluated. Meanwhile, for the haematological and serum biochemical profiles, parameters such as erythrocytes count, leukocytes count, alanine aminotransferase (ALT), gammaglutamyltransferase (GGT), Urea (BUN), and creatinine (CREA) were analyzed. The data shows no significant differences (p>0.05) between both groups' meat quality and haematological parameters analysis. The BSFL in the local village chicken diet did not affect the meat quality compared to the complete commercial feed diet. The results suggest replacing 60% of Black Soldier Fly Larvae in the local village chicken diet gave similar results on haematological and serum biochemical profile and meat quality properties compared to a fully commercial feed diet.
Keywords: Black Soldier fly, haematological, serum biochemical, meat quality parameters