SEMEN ANTIOXIDANT PROPERTIES OF BROILER BREEDER COCKS FED SUPPLEMENTAL ACETYLSALICYLIC ACID AND DIETARY INCLUSION OF SALT

Abstract

The semen antioxidant properties of breeder cocks fed varied supplemental levels of acetylsalicylic acid (ASA) and different inclusion levels of dietary salt (NaCl) was investigated in a sixteen-week study. A total of twenty Marshall Broiler Breeder cocks were used for the study. The cocks were randomly assigned into four dietary treatment in a completely randomized design and replicated four times where one cock served as a replicate of its treatment diet. The experimental diets were prepared as dietary inclusion of salt (NaCl) at 0.25%, 0.50%, 0.75%, and 1.00% with acetylsalicylic acid (ASA) supplemented in the diets at 0.00%, 0.025%, 0.050%, and 0.075% in T1, T2, T3 and T4 respectively. Semen samples was collected per replicate on the sixteenth week of the experiment for antioxidant analysis. The result of the semen antioxidant analysis revealed significant differences (p<0.05) among treatments except for the reduced glutathione. Birds on T3 recorded the lowest (4.46E-06 M-1Cm-1) lipid peroxidase value and the highest superoxide dismutase (88.2±5.29%) and catalase (4.56±0.69KU) values, an increase in glutathione peroxidase was observed with increasing ASA supplementation and NaCl inclusion. The correlation coefficients between these semen antioxidants revealed that lipid peroxidase was 82.90% and 70.20% (p<0.01) negatively correlated with superoxide dismutase and catalase respectively, while a positive and significant correlation was observed between superoxide dismutase and catalase (0.678). 0.050% ASA supplementation and 0.75% NaCl inclusion enhanced the semen antioxidant properties of the breeder cocks which is evident from the lower lipid peroxidase value recorded at this level.