REPRODUCTIVE PERFORMANCE OF RABBITS FED GRADED LEVELS OF CASHEW PULP WITH WHEAT OFFAL AS ABSORBENT

Author:
Abiodun Oluwasesan Olosunde, Nurudeen Aderemi Ajibola, Taiwo Abiola Otunla, Abigail Oluwakemi Akingbade, Olajide Williams Falohun, Olusegun Julius Oyedele, and Fidelia Anave Ajibogun

Doi: 10.26480/mahj.02.2025.75.79

This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License CC BY 4.0, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited

ABSTRACT

In a 12-week trial, thirty mixed breed does comprising New Zealand White, Chinchilla and California breedsweighing 1.40–2.00kg and aged 1-2 years were equally allocated to five dietary treatments of six does eachin a completely randomized design to evaluate and determine the reproductive performance of the rabbitsfed graded levels of cashew pulp with wheat offal as absorbent (CpWO). The proximate analysis of processedCpWO showed that it contained values of 24.02%, 94.72%, 5.93%, 53.41%, 5.28%, 5.22%, 1.42% and 89.50%for Crude protein (CP), Dry matter (DM), Crude fibre (CF), Nitrogen-free extract (NFE), Moisture content(MC), Ash content, Ether extract (EE) and Organic matter (OM), respectively. Five dietary treatments wereformulated with CpWO replacing corn bran at graded levels of:0% CpWO (T1), 10% CpWO (T2), 20% CpWO(T3), 30% CpWO (T4) and 40% CpWO (T5), respectively. The reproduction parameters evaluated were initialweight of doe, mean daily feed intake of gestating and lactating does (g), weight at parturition (kg), gestationlength, parturition weight of doe, litter size at birth, litter weight at birth, litter size at weaning, mean weightat weaning/kit and average mortality (%). There were no significant differences (p>0.05) in the reproductiveperformance parameters of the rabbits fed graded levels of cashew pulp with wheat offal as absorbent, exceptin percentage mortality. The average mortality percentage of T1 was significantly (p<0.05) higher than thatof T4, T3 and T5, respectively. The mortality of the kits was not due to the inclusion of graded levels of the testingredients. It could be concluded that cashew pulp with wheat offal as absorbent can be included up to 40%in the diets of rabbits without any deleterious effect on their reproductive performance.