Effects of Processing Methods of Leptadenia Hastata on Growth Performance, Nutrient Digestibility and Carcass Characteristics of Weaner Rabbits

Abstract

An experiment was conducted to evaluate the effects of processing methods of Leptadenia hastata on growth performance, nutrient digestibility and carcass characteristics of weaner rabbits. Thirty weaner rabbits of mixed breeds and sexes aged 5-6weeks with an average weight of 650.20g were used for the study. Five diets were formulated with L. hastata that was either washed in water (FRH), hot water processed (HWP), shade dried (SHD), oven dried (OVD) or sun dried (SUD). The rabbits were randomly allotted to five dietary treatments and were replicated three times in a completely randomized design. Results showed that there were no significant (P>0.05) differences in all the parameters measured for growth performance. Nutrient digestibility was significantly (P<0.05) influenced by the treatments. DM digestibility was significantly higher (65.60%) in T1 (FRH) while the lowest value (62.21%) was observed in T5 (SUD). CP digestibility ranged from 34.37-53.04% while the EE was between 70.10-79.03%. The digestibility values for CF and NFE ranged from 40.31-66.15% and 84.00-87.67% respectively. The carcass evaluation revealed that pelt, carcass weight and dressing percentages were significantly (P<0.05) higher in T2 (HWP). The weight of liver, lungs and kidney were significantly (P<0.05) higher in T1 (FSH). The spleen, stomach, caecal weight, caecal length, large intestine weight and small intestine length were all similar across the treatments. It can therefore be concluded that all the processing methods except the FRH can be used to improve the nutritional profile of L. hastata for improved rabbit production.