Effect of Sauropus Androgynus (Katuk) Extract on Egg Production and Lipid Metabolism in Layers

The present study was conducted to evaluate effect of Sauropus androgynus extract (SAE) on egg production and lipid metabolism in layer chickens. Forty-eight layers aged 42 weeks (strain RIR) were distributed to 6 treatment groups as follows. One group was fed diet without SAE as the control ($P_0$), and other five groups were fed diet plus hot water-extracted SAE at level of 9 g/kg diet ($W_9$), diet plus ethanol extracted SAE at level of 0.9 g/kg diet ($E_{0.9}$), diet plus ethanol extracted SAE at level of 1.8 g/kg ($E_{1.8}$), diet plus methanol extracted SAE at level of 0.9 g/kg ($M_{0.9}$), and diet plus methanol extracted SAE at level of 1.8 g/kg ($M_{1.8}$). It was shown that SAE inclusion significantly increased egg production (p<0.05). Methanol-extracted SAE groups had lower egg production than ethanol-extracted SAE group (p<0.05). SAE supplemented groups had better feed conversion efficiency than the unsupplemented group (p<0.05). It was shown that ethanol extracted SAE resulted in the lowest feed conversion efficiency among the SAE supplemented groups (p<0.05). SAE supplementation significantly reduced abdominal fat, gizzard surrounded fat, liver fat (p<0.05), serum triglyceride, total cholesterol, VLDL+LDL-c (p<0.01), atherogenic index (p<0.05), egg cholesterol and triglyceride (p<0.05), but it had no effect on mesenteric fat, sartorial fat and fatty liver score. In conclusion, SAE supplementation could increase egg production but reduced egg cholesterol.