Abstract
A study was conducted to investigate the optimum inclusion level of Cochlospermum planchonii in diets of West African Dwarf (WAD) goats. Twenty five (25) WAD bucks aged 6 to 8 months and assigned to five treatments (T1- T5) of five goats each were used. Goats in T1 were given normal diet and served as the control, while those in T2, T3, T4 and T5 were respectively given diets with inclusion levels of 5, 10, 20 and 40% C. planchonii. Feed intake, body weight (BWT) and body condition score (BCS) were evaluated weekly from day 0 (D0) to D84, while rumen pH, rumen ammonia, urinary and faecal nitrogen were assessed on D84. The total forage intake across the treatments was comparable (p> 0.05), but the total concentrate intake by T5 (12.1 ± 0.8 kg) was significantly (p < 0.05) lower than the rest of the treatments. Supplementation of C. planchonii was associated with enhanced weight gain among the supplemented groups. The rumen pH of T4 and T5 were 6.2 ± 0.04 and 6.1 ± 0.1 respectively and these were significantly (p < 0.05) higher than those of T1 (5.8 ± 0.1), T2 (5.7 ± 0.1) and T3 (5.6 ± 0.1), 6 h post feeding. At 12 h post feeding, the pH of T5 was significantly (p < 0.05) higher than the rest of the treatments, while at 18 h post feeding, there was no significant difference in the rumen pH of all the treatments. The mean total volatile fatty acid produced by T1 (59 ± 8.9) was significantly (p< 0.05) higher than that of T5 (37. 8 ± 6.3). It was therefore, concluded that supplementation of C. planchonii in diets of West African Dwarf goats up to 20% could exert beneficial effects on their productivity. Key words: Cochlospermum planchonii, feed intake, dietary inclusion, rumen fermentation, performance, West African Dwarf bucks.
Highlights
Livestock rearing provides a strong economic support to peasant farmers in rural areas of Nigeria where 80% of the population reside (Inoni, 2010)
The results revealed a decrease in feed intake with increasing concentration of C. planchonii
The average daily concentrate intake ranged from 144 to 208 g/day and this was lower than the range of 364 to 457 g/day obtained by Adedeji et al, (2014) who fed concentrate and groundnut husk to West African Dwarf goats and 529 to 559 g/day by Ajayi et al (2014) who fed concentrate diets to WAD goats
Summary
Livestock rearing provides a strong economic support to peasant farmers in rural areas of Nigeria where 80% of the population reside (Inoni, 2010). In rural areas where modern veterinary health care system is very poor, the inhabitants have developed several indigenous veterinary health care practices to maintain livestock populations (Matekaire and Bwakura, 2004). Ethnoveterinary practice is the application of local knowledge, skills, methods and beliefs in the management of animal health using natural plant products (Tiwari and Pande, 2010). These plants are used variously as anti-parasitic, antidiarrhoeal, antimicrobial as well as anti-inflammatory agents (Alawa et al, 2003; Ademola et al, 2004; Atawodi et al, 2005; Anyanwu and Okoye, 2017; Rawat et al, 2016; Oguntibeju, 2018). Medicinal plants are known to stimulate the endocrine system for enhanced reproductive capacity in both male and female animals (Chauhan et al, 2014; Khojasteh et al, 2016)
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