THE UTILIZATION OF QUINOA (CHENOPODIUM-QUINOA W) FORAGE IN DIETS FOR BROILERS

986 broilers of approximately one day of age were used to study the ef fect of 0, 5, 10 and 15% sun dried quinoa forage meal dried at sunligh t on wheat based diets. Forage meal substituted part of the wheat and soybean in the diet and maintained isoproteic diets but not isocaloric diets. Seven replicates were used per treatment with 32 chickens per replication up to 28 days of age and 14 chickens per replication of 28 and 49 days of age in a completely randomized design. Health was sati sfactory in all the treatments. Average weight was reduced (P < .10) 4 .5 g/bird per unit of forage meal increase and only feed conversion di ffered between treatments (P < 0.05) which was poorer with forage meal at any level. However, conventional raw material conversion did not d iffer between treatments. It is considered that up to 15% of quinoa fo rage meal could be included in the diets without provoking negative ef fects in health when wheat based diets are employed. Nevertheless, its utilization is not recommended since it does not significantly improv e the utilization of conventional raw material nor feeding cost per kg of live weight gain.