The identification and development of new and effective alternatives to antibiotics that do not hinder productivity assumes paramount importance in the context of antimicrobial resistance and food safety. In recent years, phytobiotics have been used as natural growth promoters in ruminants, poultry and swine, to improve growth and health. A wide variety of herbs, spices and essential oils have been used individually or as blends in poultry for their potential application as alternative growth promoters. In nursery and growing pigs supplemented with phytobiotics, intestinal pathogens were inhibited and beneficial microbial population that contributes to improving digestion and absorption of nutrients were increased resulting in increased weight gain and decrease in diarrheal syndrome. The inclusion of essential oils in the diet of finishing pigs, improved the productive yield and carcass characteristics. It also reduced the incidence of therapeutic treatment and mortality. Natural plant products have the potential to improve rumen fermentation, reduce loss of feed energy, improve animal health and productivity, increase animal lifetime performance, and reduce greenhouse gases production in ruminants. Phytobiotics with wide range of activities, is projected as a feed additive for higher market growth compared to other alternatives to antibiotics in the feed industry.

 The experiment was conducted to assess the effect of replacement of maize by wheat bran on growth and feed conversion efficiency in Large White Yorkshire (LWY) pigs. Thirty weaned piglets were randomly divided into three groups and were allotted to the three dietary treatments, T1 (control ration as per NRC, 1998), T2 (50 per cent of maize of control ration replaced by wheat bran) and T3 (100 per cent of maize of control ration replaced by wheat bran) and maintained for 70 days. The daily feed intake, fortnightly body weight were recorded and average daily gain and feed conversion efficiency were calculated. The average daily gain and feed conversion efficiency were 813.00, 769.86, 678.43 g and 2.80, 2.88, 3.08, respectively for three dietary treatments. There was no significant difference in the performance between pigs belongs to T1 and T2 treatments but had higher average daily gain and feed conversion efficiency than that of T3 treatment. This study reveals that pigs fed diet with 50 per cent of maize replaced by wheat bran performed in a similar way to that of control fed group and was better than those fed diet with 100 per cent replacement of maize by wheat bran.

This study was conducted to assess the effect of dietary supplementation of vitamin E and selenium on Japanese quail broilers. This trial was conducted in 525 Japanese quail birds from day- old to five weeks of age. Experimental birds were randomly divided into seven groups viz.T1Control:  Basal diet (standard Japanese quail ration), T2 Basal diet with vitamin E 150mg/kg, T3 Basal diet with vitamin E 300 mg/kg, T4 Basal diet with selenium 0.3mg/kg, T5 Basal diet with selenium 0.6mg/kg,T6 Basal diet with combination of vitamin E 150mg/kg and selenium 0.3mg/kg, T7 Basal diet with combination of vitamin E 300mg/kg and selenium 0.6mg/kg. Dietary supplementation with the combination of vitamin E 300mg/kg and selenium 0.6mg/kg resulted in significantly higher body weight, better feed efficiency, livability percentage and also enrichment of alpha-tocopherol and selenium level of liver, thigh and breast muscles in the Japanese quail broilers.