The Effect of Soaked Cassava Peels on Weanling Rabbits

Abstract

The effects of using milled sun-dried cassava peels soaked in water to substitute maize in the diet of mixed breed (Californian x Dutch) weanling rabbits averaging 831 g in body weight were examined in an 8 - week experiment. One of four portions of fresh cassava peels was sun-dried immediately after collection while one of each of the remaining 3 was soaked in basin of water for 1, 3, and 5 hrs before sun-drying. Each portion of the milled peels replaced maize in control diet (MD) at 20% level to give diets UD, S1D, S3D and S5D, respectively. Soaking of peels stimulated a progressive reduction in HCN from 24 to 10.33 mg/kg CPM. Daily BWG, feed intake, FCR and water intake per rabbit were not significantly affected (p >0.05) by water-soaking cassava peels. Dressing percentage and relative weights of heart, liver, kidney, stomach, intestine and caecum were also not significantly different (p>0.05) among treatments. The performance of the S1D fed rabbit was comparatively better than for the control group, while in terms of economics of production all the cassava peel meal diets proved to be more cost effective than the maize-based diet. Cassava peel meal based diets were more cost effective than the control diet.


The Journal of Food Technology in Africa Volume 7 No.1, 2002, pp. 12-15



KEY WORDS:

Rabbits, water-soaked cassava peels, performance, carcass quality.