Effects of dietary electrolyte balance on growth performance, nitrogen metabolism and some blood biochemical parameters of growing rabbits.

J W Li,X P Wang,F C Li,Y L Zhu,C Y Wang

doi:10.5713/ajas.2013.13241

Abstract

The effects of different dietary electrolyte balance (DEB) on growth performance, nitrogen (N) metabolism and some blood biochemical parameters were investigated in 2 to 3 months old growing rabbits. A total of 150 growing rabbits of 2 months age were randomly divided into five groups according to average body weight, with 30 rabbits in each group. The DEB levels of the five experimental diets were −154, −3.16, +201, +347, and +500 meq/kg of dry matter (DM), respectively. There was a 7-d adaptation period and a 23-d experimental period. The results showed that the DEB levels had a quadratic affect on the average daily feed intake (ADFI) (p<0.001). The greatest ADFI was achieved when the DEB level was +201 meq/kg DM. Fecal N (FN) content linearly decreased (0.047), while digestible N (DN), retained N (RN), efficiency of intake N converted into digestible N (DN/IN) and the efficiency of intake N converted into retained N (RN/IN) linearly increased with the DEB increase (0.020, 0.004, 0.021, and 0.049, respectively). Serum phosphorus (P) ion content linearly increased with the DEB increase (p = 0.036). The DEB had a quadratic relationship with serum anion gap (AG) (p = 0.002) and serum parathyroid hormone (PTH) content (p = 0.016). The DEB levels quadratically affected base excess (BE) in the plasma (p<0.001). In conclusion, the DEB unaffected growth performance but affected feed intake, N metabolism and some blood biochemical parameters of growing rabbits.

Highlights

Mineral requirements of rabbits has been recently reviewed (Mateos et al, 2010), but there was limited information on some macroelements of the diet
There was a quadratic effect of the DEB on the average daily feed intake (ADFI)
There was no effect on feed to gain (F/G) and average daily weight gain (ADG) among the treatments (p>0.05)

Summary

Introduction

Mineral requirements of rabbits has been recently reviewed (Mateos et al, 2010), but there was limited information on some macroelements of the diet. It is well known that the relationship between Na+, K+, and Cl- (the dietary electrolyte balance, DEB) affects animal performance. Rizzi et al (2005) did not observe any effect on the performance of bucks during three reproductive cycles with electrolyte balances of 270 or 350 meq/kg diets. The present study was planned to examine the effect of varying levels of the DEB on the growth performance, nitrogen (N) metabolism and some blood biochemical parameters of growing rabbits.

Results

Conclusion