Role of medicinal mushroom on growth performance and physiological responses in broiler chicken

SUMMARYSupplementing broiler diets with medicinal mushrooms is considered an effective alternative to prophylactic antibiotics. Feeding certain mushrooms may have beneficial effects on gut health in broilers, whereby trials have shown weight gain was increased about 5.2% when feeding 5% of the Hericium caput-medusae mushrooms in the diet. Both Salmonella spp. and E. coli numbers in the caecum were significantly lowered from 5.036 to 3.031 log10 CFU/g and from 5.405 to 4.759 log10 CFU/g when 50 g/kg or 30 g/kg of Flammulina velutipes mushrooms were included in feed, respectively, compared to an unsupplemented control group. Beneficial bacteria (Lactobacilli spp.) were found in significantly higher numbers (increased from 6.45 to 8.05 log10 CFU/g) and Bifidobacter spp. (increased from 6.28 to 7.77 log10…