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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Anim. Sci.
Sec. Animal Nutrition
Volume 6 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fanim.2025.1531761

Replacement of Soybean Meal with Acheta domesticus Improved Broiler Productive Performance, Health, and Meat QualityComparative Evaluation of Acheta domesticus and Hermetia illucens as an Alternative Protein Sources for the Growth, Health, and Meat Quality of the Broiler

Provisionally accepted
Farwa Mustafa Farwa Mustafa 1*Asif Sajjad Asif Sajjad 1*Muhammad Sajjad Muhammad Sajjad 1*Mudssar Ali Mudssar Ali 2*Hafiza Sehrish Bashir Hafiza Sehrish Bashir 1Muhammad Ghazanfar Abbas Muhammad Ghazanfar Abbas 3Muhammad Binyameen Muhammad Binyameen 3Raimondas Mozuraitis Raimondas Mozuraitis 4*
  • 1 Department of Entomology, Faculty of Agriculture and Environment, Islamia University of Bahawalpur, Bahawalpur, Punjab, Pakistan
  • 2 Institute of Plant Protection, Faculty of Agriculture & Environmental Science, Muhammad Nawaz Shareef University of Agriculture, Multan, Punjab, Pakistan
  • 3 Faculty of Agricultural Sciences & Technology, Bahauddin Zakariya University, Multan, Punjab, Pakistan
  • 4 Department of Zoology, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Insects are receiving increasing attraction due to their potential to enhance farming efficiency and sustainability, mitigate vast quantities of bio-waste and improve animal performance. Their wellbalanced nutritional compositions make them an appropriate protein source for substituting high-value conventional protein sources. It is hypothesized that the replacement of soybean meal with Acheta domesticus will improve broiler productive performance, health, and meat quality. Therefore, Tthe objective of this study was to assess the effect of gradual replacement of soybean meal (4%, 8% and 12%) with house cricket (Acheta domesticus) and black solider fly (Hermetia illucens) on productive performances, hematology, intestinal morphology and meat quality attributes of male broiler (Ross 308). A total of 350Three hundred-and fifty-one-day-old chicks (39.23 ± 0.19 g) were divided into seven groups (5 pens per group and ten chicks per pen) following a completely randomized design. The seven groups included 4%, 8%, and 12% SBM replacements with A. domesticus and H. illucens. Soybean meal was the basal diet considered the control. The results indicated that the broilers fed 12% A. domesticus or 12% H. illucens had significantly higher (p < 0.05) live weight, average daily weight gain and improved feed conversion ratio (p < 0.05) than the broilers fed basal (SBM) diet throughout starter, grower and finisher phases. Hematology (complete blood count and serum biochemistry traits) and intestinal morphology (villus height, villus width, crypt depth and villus height to crypt dipth ratio) of the broilers improved when fed on 12% A. domesticus and 12% H. illucens meals as compared to

    Keywords: Font: Bold, Font color: Black Acheta domesticus, broiler, Hematology, Hermetia illucens, Productive performance, replacement

    Received: 20 Nov 2024; Accepted: 09 Jan 2025.

    Copyright: © 2025 Mustafa, Sajjad, Sajjad, Ali, Bashir, Abbas, Binyameen and Mozuraitis. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence:
    Farwa Mustafa, Department of Entomology, Faculty of Agriculture and Environment, Islamia University of Bahawalpur, Bahawalpur, Punjab, Pakistan
    Asif Sajjad, Department of Entomology, Faculty of Agriculture and Environment, Islamia University of Bahawalpur, Bahawalpur, Punjab, Pakistan
    Muhammad Sajjad, Department of Entomology, Faculty of Agriculture and Environment, Islamia University of Bahawalpur, Bahawalpur, Punjab, Pakistan
    Mudssar Ali, Institute of Plant Protection, Faculty of Agriculture & Environmental Science, Muhammad Nawaz Shareef University of Agriculture, Multan, Punjab, Pakistan
    Raimondas Mozuraitis, Department of Zoology, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.