ABSTRACT
In a feeding trial which was conducted to study the nutritive value of air-dried Gliricidia leaf meal (GLM) supplemented with Maxigrain® enzyme using Sixty laying hens (Rhode Island Red strains). The birds were randomly allotted to five dietary treatments of 12 birds per treatment; each treatment was replicated into 4 groups with 3 birds per replicate. Five experimental diets were formulated; the test ingredient being Gliricidia sepium. Four of the diets were formulated with enzyme (Maxigrain®) supplementation i.e. diets B, C, D, E while diet A was without enzyme supplementation. Gliricidia sepium leaf meal was included at 5%, 7.5% and 10% replacement of dietary soyabean meal in diets C, D and E respectively. The feeding trial lasted for twelve weeks during which data performance characteristics in terms of Henday production, feed intake, weight gain, and body weight changes were monitored. Digestibility trial was carried out in the last four days of the experiment. All data collected were analyzed using the Analysis of variance (Anova). Daily feed intake was more significantly (p0.05) hen day egg production, which worsened significantly with increase in GLM inclusion 5, 7.5 and 10%GLM levels. Egg quality values showed that there was no significant differences (p>0.05) in terms of egg weight, albumen index, Haugh unit and shell thickness while yolk index increased (p
