Productive performance of rabbits as influenced by source of fibre and chemical treatment of dietary maize cob sawdust and mango leaves

Abstract

An experiment was conducted using 36 growing rabbits of mixed breeds and sexes with initial liveweight of 658g to evaluate the effect of feeding diets containing three different fibre sources, Maize Cob (MC); Sawdust (SD); and Mango Leaves (ML) which were subjected to three processing methods viz: untreated, NaOH and Urea treated. The fibre materials were incorporated such that the various experimental diets had approximately 12% crude fibre. The rabbits were randomly allocated to nine experimental diets such that four individually caged rabbits served as replicates for each dietary treatment. The feeding trial lasted for 56 days. Although a slight decline in dry matter value of all the fibre sources was observed as a result of chemical treatment, the crude protein content increased with treatment with maize cob being an exception where the crude protein value was reduced as a result of NaOH treatment. Dietary treatments had significant (P<0.05) effects on the feed intake, weight gain and water intake. Feed intake and weight gain of rabbits on SD and ML treated with NaOH and Urea were significantly (P<0.05) higher than those on MC. Rabbits on Urea-treated fibre materials drank significantly (P<0.05) less water compared with those fed untreated and NaOH treated fibre-based diets. Feed conversion ratio was not influenced by fibre source nor by processing method. Carcass characteristics and organ weights and gut dimensions were also not significantly (P>0.05) affected by fibre source or processing methods nor by their interaction thereby suggesting that the comparative ability of the different materials and processing methods in promoting carcass quality attributes and gut activities were the same.

Keywords: fibre materials; sodium hydroxide; urea; rabbit performance; carcass quality; gut attributes

Moor Journal of Agricultural Research Vol. 5(2) 2004: 115-121