Performance and blood profile of young doe rabbits fed diets containing two varieties of composite sweet potato (<i>ipomoea batatas Lam</i>) meal in a palm kernel based diets

Abstract

Eighty-four does of mixed breeds aged 6-8 weeks, weighing 550–600g were used to determine the effect of feeding two varieties of composite sweet  potato (Ipomoea batatas) root m eal (CSPM) on the haematological and serum biochemical indices of rabbits. The rabbits were randomly allocated into seven treatments. T1  was the control while T2, T3, T4, contained 25, 50 and 75 % of maize replaced with CIP440293 CSPM and T5, T6 and T7 contained TIS87/0087 CSPM replaced with 25, 50 and 75 % of maize. The treatments had four replicates each in a Completely Randomized Design (CRD) experiment. The diets contained 10.6-12.6 % crude fibre, 16.4-17.6 % crude protein and 2610-2788 Kcal/Kg metabolizable energy. Parameters measured were growth, haematological and serum biochemical index of the rabbit. The result showed that there were significant  (P<0.05) differences on the final weight gain, daily feed intake, daily weight gain, feed cost and survival ability of the rabbits. The FCR was not significantly (P>0.05) different across the dietary treatments. At the end of nine weeks of feeding trial, blood samples were collected from three rabbits per treatment. The results indicate that the dietary treatments had significant (P<0.05) influence on the concentrations of white blood cells and eosinophils. However, there were no significant influence of the diets on other haematological parameters. Total protein, urea, globulin and creatinine were also not affected (P>0.05) by the treatment diets but albumin, cholesterol, glucose, aspartate transaminase (AST), alanine transaminase (ALT) and alkaline phosphatase (ALP) were influenced by the different dietary treatments. These results show that CSPM of two varieties can be included up 50 % in growing rabbit diets without adverse effect on haematology and serum indices of rabbits.

Keywords: Rabbits, Sweet potato composite meal, haematology, serum biochemistry,
performance