scholarly journals Comparative Evaluation of the Growth Performance and Feed Intake of Weaned Rabbits Fed Tropical Grasses and Selected Forage Leaves

2020 ◽  
Vol 21 (8) ◽  
pp. 626-632 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dawei Liu ◽  
Qinghua Wu ◽  
Hongyi Liu ◽  
Changhu Lu ◽  
Chao Gu ◽  
...  

Background: The red-crowned crane (Grus japonensis) is one of the most vulnerable bird species in the world. Mycotoxins are toxic secondary metabolites produced by fungi and considered naturally unavoidable contaminants in animal feed. Our recent survey indicated that the mycotoxins had the potential to contaminate redcrowned crane’s regular diets in China. Objective: This experiment was conducted to investigate the protective effects of mycotoxin binder montmorillonite (Mont) on growth performance, serum biochemistry and oxidative stress parameters of the red-crowned crane. Methods: 16 red-crowned cranes were divided into four groups and fed one of the following diets; a selected diet, regular diet, or the selected diet or regular diet with 0.5% montmorillonite added to the diets. The cranes' parameters of performance, hematology, serum biochemistry and serum oxidative stress were measured. Results: Consuming regular diets decreased the average daily feed intake (ADFI), levels of haemoglobin (Hb), platelet count (PLT), superoxide dismutase (SOD), glutathione peroxidase (GSH-Px) and catalase (CAT), but increased the activities of aspartate aminotransferase (AST), alanine aminotransferase (ALT), creatine kinase (CK) and lactate dehydrogenase (LDH). The supplementation of 0.5% Mont provided protection for the red-crowned crane in terms of feed intake, serum biochemistry and oxidative stress. Moreover, Mont supplementation had no adverse effect on the health of red-crowned crane. Conclusions: Taken together, these findings suggested that the addition of dietary Mont is effective in improving the health of red-crowned crane.


2019 ◽  
Vol 3 (4) ◽  
pp. 1162-1172
Author(s):  
Tassilo Brand ◽  
Martin Hünerberg ◽  
Tim A McAllister ◽  
Maolong He ◽  
Atef M Saleem ◽  
...  

Abstact: The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effect of a phytogenic feed additive (Digestarom [DA]; Biomin, Getzersdorf, Austria) on growth performance, feed intake, carcass traits, fatty acid composition, and liver abscesses of finishing steers. One hundred twenty Angus × Charolais crossbred steers (488 ± 26.5 kg) were used in a 110-d feeding experiment. Steers were blocked by weight and randomly assigned to 12 pens with 10 steers per pen. Each pen was allocated to one of three diets. Each diet contained 86.5% barley, 10.0% barley silage, and 3.5% vitamin and mineral supplement on a dry matter (DM) basis. The diets contained 0, 0.05, and 0.1 g DA/kg complete diet (DM basis), to achieve average daily DA intakes of 0 (control), 0.5 (LowDA), and 1.0 g (HighDA) per steer. Diets were prepared once daily and provided ad libitum. Two pens per treatment were equipped to record individual feed intake behavior. Steers were weighed every 28 d and carcass traits and liver scores were recorded at slaughter. Dry matter intake (average: 9.34 kg/d) did not differ (P > 0.05) among diets. Average daily gain tended to increase linearly as DA increased (control: 1.82; LowDA: 1.87; and HighDA: 1.95 kg/d; P < 0.09), but gain:feed ratio was not affected. Supplementation of DA affected longissimus muscle area quadratically (P = 0.05) with the largest area observed for LowDA. However, dressing percentage decreased linearly in response to increasing level of DA (P < 0.01). Total abscessed livers were not affected, whereas proportion of severe liver abscesses was numerically lower with DA (30.8% and 42.5% for LowDA and HighDA) compared to the control (50%).


2020 ◽  
Vol 40 (2) ◽  
pp. 104-111
Author(s):  
O. A. Abu ◽  
O. H. Amusa ◽  
R. O. Atoyebi ◽  
R. A. Kehinde ◽  
F. C. Nworgu

A total of fifty 3-4 weeks old albino rats of the Wistar strain weighing 50-60g were randomly allocated to five dietary treatments in a completely randomized block design to investigate the growth performance and nutrient digestibility of the rats fed diets containing processed dehulled jack bean. Five diets were formulated to contain casein (T1)-control diet, dehulled jack bean soaked in filtrate obtained from raw pap(T2), dehulled jack bean soaked in lye solution (T3), dehulled jack bean boiled for 15minutes (T4) while a protein free diet served as a negative control (T5). The experiment lasted for 28-days.Dehulled jack bean significantly (P>0.05) influenced the growth parameters measured for the Wistar rats. Rats on control diets had the highest value for all the growth indices, feed intake (210.90g), final body weight (103.40g), body weight changes (41.90g), feed conversion ratio (5.10) and protein efficiency ratio (1.41). Rats on T2 (soaked in ‘ogi’ liquor) had feed intake value of (147.40g), followed by rats on T4 (boiled for 15minutes) (117.00g), T5 (negative control) (119.07) and T3 (soaked in lye solution) (79.40g) respectively. Rats on T4 had the highest value for final body weight (67.80g), body weight changes (6.30g), feed conversion ratio (12.27) and protein efficiency ratio (0.25) while rats on T3 had the lowest value for final body weight (67.80g), body weight changes (-32.45g), total feed intake (79.40g) with FCR of (-0.96) for the tested diets. Wistar rats placed on lye treated diet had depressed body weight changes of 59.8% compared to the control. Digestibility studies however showed that rats on control diets had the highest digestibility value of DM and other nutrients, while there was no significant (P<0.05) difference in digestibility value of CF, significant (P>0.05) differences existed in DM, digestibility value of CP, EE and Ash. Rats on T3 and T5 had the lowest digestibility value for Ash (11.48) and CP (37.66). Rats fed dehulled jack bean seed soaked in ogi liquor and boiled for 15minutes showed slight improvement in growth performance and nutrient utilization over those fed lye soaked jack bean. All the processing methods were ineffective when compared to the performance of rat fed casein based diets.


2021 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 27-34
Author(s):  
A.I. Ukanwoko ◽  
C.T. Alfred

An experiment was carried out to determine the growth performance and haematological indices of Red Sokoto goats placed on oil palm leaf meal (OPLM)-wheat offal based diet. Six goats aged 12-18 months, weighing 15 – 20kg were randomly assigned to three treatments, comprising two animals each in a Completely Randomized Design. Each animal received 1kg of the diet daily for 56 days and weighed weekly. Results showed that final body weight was significant (P<0.05) with goats on T3 having the highest (21.50kg). The feed intake, body weight gain and Feed Conversion Ratio (FCR) were significantly different (P<0.05). T3 had the highest feed intake (305.35g/d), highest body weight gain (90.84g/d) and the best FCR (3.36). Significant differences (P <0.05) were observed in the Red Blood Cell (RBC), Packed Cell Volume (PCV) and Haemoglobin (Hb) counts, ranging between 3.12 - 4.20x106ml; 23.00 -30.50% and 7.70 - 10.15g/dl respectively with goats on T3 having the highest.  The inclusion of OPLM enhanced body weight gain, FCR, RBC, PCV, and Hb counts of the goats. Therefore the oil palm leaf meal diets are recommended for better goat production. Key word: Growth performance; Oil Palm Leaf meal., Blood profile., Creatinine., Red Sokoto Goat.


2000 ◽  
Vol 80 (1) ◽  
pp. 25-33 ◽  
Author(s):  
K. L. Hammell ◽  
J. P. Laforest

Data for a total of approximately 1100 lambs tested in 12 trials from 1992 to 1995 in commercial lamb test stations in Quebec were used to determine the effect of sex, sire breed and genetic type on growth performance and carcass characteristics. Lambs were housed two to a pen and fed commercial diets. Maximum test length was 112 d. Lambs were slaughtered when their liveweight was approximately 47 ± 5 kg for the males and 43 ± 4 kg for the females. Feed intake and growth rate were measured during the test, and carcass measurements were taken at slaughter and at 24 h following slaughter. Feed intake was the average for the pen, while the growth and carcass measurements were taken individually. Males ate more per day, had better gain and were younger at slaughter than females. Females had more body fat and better carcass conformation scores than males. However, males did not have a greater loin muscle thickness compared to females. Lambs sired by Hampshire or Suffolk rams had superior growth performance and leaner carcasses than lambs sired by Dorset rams. However, Hampshire and Suffolk-sired lambs did not have a greater loin muscle thickness compared to Dorset-sired lambs. Analysis of different genetic types did not demonstrate a pronounced effect on lamb performance. No specific genetic composition was clearly superior to the others for the various variables studied. Genetic quality within a breed of sheep bought or kept for reproduction is as important as the choice of breed or the combination of breeds. Key words: Lamb, growth performance, carcass composition


2021 ◽  
Vol 44 (3) ◽  
pp. 354-365
Author(s):  
B. O. Alabi ◽  
T. O. Ososanya

Crude protein is essentially needed for ruminants but expensive to supply. Mucuna puriens is a high yielding domesticated legume. When the legume is strategically combined with a fibre source, it will make a good diet for ruminants. Thus, a study was carried out to assess the effect of ensiling mucuna with maize forage on performance of rams. In the study, rams were fed silage combinations of Maize Forage (MF) and Mucuna pruriens foliage (MPF). Downy mildew and streak resistant (DMR-SR) yellow variety maize was planted and harvested as MF at six weeks of growth and ensiled with MPF at four levels : 1:0, 3:1, 1:1 and 1:3 for 21 days. All the four silages were fed to 20 WAD rams (12.00±0.25 Kg) in a completely randomised design for 105 days. Proximate composition of the silages, apparent nutrient digestibility of silages in WAD rams, feed intake and weight changes were determined using standard procedures, while feed conversion ratio was computed using standard procedures. Data obtained were analysed using descriptive statistics and ANOVA at α0.05...The dry matter (DM) was significantly higher in T1 (25.65±0.62) and T2 (23.48±0.47) than T3 (21.80±0.41) and T4 (21.57±0.40). The crude protein (CP) was highest in T4 (13.0±0.6) and least in T1 (8.0±0.2). The crude fibre was significantly higher in T1 (26.4±2.6) and T2 (26.2±2.0) than T3 (24.0±1.8) and T4 (21.6±0.9). Apparent digestibility of neutral detergent fibre (NDF) was highest in T2 (59.2±1.7) and least in T4 (37.7±1.9), while percentage nitrogen retention was significantly higher in T2 (43.2±3.8) and lower in T1 (20.0±4.3). The FCR for rams fed T2 was significantly lower (8.84±1.2) than T1 (9.76±0.80), T3 (9.60 ±0.60) and T4 (11.50±0.90) Ensiling maize forage with Mucuna pruriens foliage at 3:1 enhanced nutrient digestibility and growth performance in West African dwarf rams without any deleterious effect.


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