European Journal of Biotechnology and Bioscience

Authors
Shittu MD, Alagbe JO, Rafiu TA, Oye KE, Oladokun PO, Agbaje IA

Abstract
The dietary protein of animal origin is in short supply for the populace and the available sources are too expensive for an average Nigerian family because of the high cost of production. This study was conducted to investigate the response of growing rabbits fed Cassava Root Meal (CRM) on growth performance, Nutrient digestibility, blood profile and organs parameters of mixed-breed rabbits. Twenty four rabbits (24) were used in completely randomized design (CRD) experiment with four treatments and six rabbits per treatment. Each rabbit serves as replicate and experiment lasted for eight weeks. Four diet were formulated T₁ (control- maize based diet) while T₂, T₃, and T₄ maize were replaced with cassava root meal at 33.33%, 66.67% and 100%, respectively. Growth parameters measured were weight gain, feed intake, final weight gain, average daily feed intake, feed conversion ratio, feed cost/kg and feed cost per kg/Weight Gain (WG) while blood parameter measured include all haematological parameters and some selected blood serum. Other parameters measured include nutrient digestibility and relative organs weight. Growth performance were significantly different (p<0.05) in weight gain, feed conversion ratio, cost/kg and cost/kg/WG across the treatments, while final weight gain, total feed intake and average daily feed intake were numerical different across the treatments. However, treatment T₃ with 66.67% inclusion of cassava root meal had the highest weight gain with lowest feed conversion ratio. The nutrient digestibility shows that crude protein, crude fibre, ash, ether extract and dry matter digestibilities were significantly different across the treatments while nitrogen free extract was numerically different across the treatments. However T₄ (100% CRM) provided high percentage crude protein, crude fibre, ash and dry matter digestibilities compared to other treatments which contain 0%, 33.33%, and 66.67% cassava root meal. The replacement of maize with CRM at 66.67% levels improved the growth performance, feed efficiency and blood parameters as compared to the control diet. All relative organs were statistically similar except abdominal fat. It was concluded from this study that 100% cassava root meal inclusion can be used to replace maize without any side effect in the rabbit’s production, this help to reduce the cost of production especially during the time of maize scarcity.