Toxicological Studies of Fruit Powder and Extracted Cake of &amp;lt;i&amp;gt;Melia volkensii&amp;lt;/i&amp;gt; Guerke (Family: Meliaceae) on Maasai Goats in Kenya

Wanzala Wycliffe

doi:10.11648/j.ijpc.20170306.13

Abstract

Goat supplement feeds prepared from a dried Melia volkensii (Mv) fruit powder, which is known to contain insecticidal activity and the residual cake obtained after extracting oil from the fruit powder with aqueous ethanol, to remove the insecticidal activity do not adversely affect the growth and performance of Maasai goats even after exposure to the feed for two months. The feed prepared from the residual Mv cake was found to be more acceptable and palatable to the goats compared to the Mv powder, which was unextracted. Goats fed on the Mv residual cake also showed better performance than the controls fed on the wheat bran supplement or the ones fed on Mv powder. It is concluded from this study that Mv dry fruit powder and Mv extracted residual cake could be used as safe ruminant feed supplements in rural areas where M. volkensii is prominently on medicinal common use traditionally. The results also indicated that Mv is non-toxic to this ruminant mammalian model, hence environmentally safe for human use as insecticide with respect to a wide range of ethnic-based traditional claims. However, more in-depth scientific studies are necessary to generate sufficient data under different environmental conditions for comparative analysis and henceforth, considerations.

Highlights

Melia volkensii Guerke, 1895 (Family: Meliaceae) is a tropical tree found growing throughout the East African countries and native in Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia and Tanzania [1, 2]
The 15 six month old male castrated Maasai goats were purchased form a goat market in Nairobi, Kenya and kept in an animal house for one week to acclimatize. They were divided into 3 groups of 5 goats per group and one group of 5 goats was fed on purely wheat bran, another one was fed on Melia volkensii (Mv) fruit powder, while the remaining group of 5 goats was fed on extracted Mv fruit powder for 56 days of the experiment
The control group, which consumed the highest mean weight of dry supplement matter, produced the lowest feacal matter compared to the groups that were fed on Mv powder

Summary

Introduction

Melia volkensii Guerke, 1895 (Family: Meliaceae) is a tropical tree found growing throughout the East African countries and native in Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia and Tanzania [1, 2]. The tree is deciduous, open crowned and laxly branched, ranging between 6 and 20 m tall when fully grown and mature. It is widely used in folk medicine for treatment of a number of diseases including pain relief [3] in a similar version, just like the Azadirachta indica A. The aim of this study was to evaluate the Mv residual cake as a ruminant animal supplement feed as well as to attempt to detect any toxicological effects the Mv milled powder and extracted cake that they may have on the Maasai goat as a mammalian ruminant animal model since the goat is known to feed on the M. volkensii fruits in pasture

Methods

Results

Conclusion