PERFORMANCE OF GROWER CROSS BRED RABBITS OF FED FONIO (DIGITARIA EXILIS) OFFAL AS FIBRE SOURCE

Abstract

The over relying on wheat offal and in lesser cases maize or rice offal as fibre source in feed formulation particularly for mongastrics livestock threatens some locally available offals which perhaps could have provide alternatives. Therefore, to search for alternative, this study was conducted to determine the performance of grower rabbits of cross breed fed fonio (Digitaria exilis) offal as fibre source. Five diets (designated as T1, T2, T3, T4, and T5) were formulated. The content of wheat offal (WO) was replaced with fonio offal (FO) by 0%, 25%, 50%, 75% and 100%, respectively. The 0% (T1) served as control. Twenty five (25) grower rabbits of cross breed at 5 weeks old were used. They were distributed randomly into the five diets. Each diet had 5 rabbits and each rabbit represents a replicate. Rabbits fed on T5 had highest (p<0.05) total weight gain (TWG), daily weight gain (DWG) and best feed conversion ratio (FCR) than those fed on T4, T3, T2 and T1. Similarly, those fed on T4 and T3 had higher (p<0.05) weight gains and FCR than those fed on T2 and T1 while those
fed on T2 had similar (p>0.05) with those fed on T1. Total feed intake and daily feed intake were similar (p>0.05) among treatments. There was no mortality. It may be concluded that FO can totally replace WO in grower rabbits‘ diet without negative effect performance. Therefore, FO is recommended as alternative for WO.