EFFECT OF DIETARY UREA MOLASSES MULTI-NUTRIENT CAKE (UMMC) ON PRODUCTIVE AND REPRODUCTIVE PERFORMANCE OF RABBIT

Abstract

The present study was designed to investigate the effect of dietary supplementation of urea molasses multi-nutrient cake (UMMC) on productive and reproductive performances of rabbit. A couple of experiments were conducted using New Zealand rabbits at the Rabbit Research Farm, Hajee Mohammad Danesh Science and Technology University, Dinajpur, Bangladesh. In Experiment-I, 20 rabbit does (age 24 weeks) were randomly assigned into four dietary treatment groups (T0, T1, T2 and T3) to investigate the effect of UMMC on the reproductive performances. In Experiment-II, 28 young rabbits (age 5 weeks) were also randomly assigned into another four dietary treatment groups to investigate the effect of UMMC on the productive performance. The rabbits of four dietary treatment groups (T0, T1, T2 and T3) in both experiments were fed 0, 4, 6 and 8% urea containing UMMC, respectively. The results revealed that the dietary supplementation of UMMC increased (P<0.05) live weight of pregnant does, conception rate, litter size, and litter weight and individual kit weight at weaning. On the other hand, dietary supplementation of UMMC reduced (P<0.05) the kit mortality, though UMMC supplementation did not affect the gestation period, litter size, litter weight and individual weight of rabbit kits at birth. The present findings also revealed that the dietary supplementation of UMMC improved (P<0.05) the productive performances of growing rabbits in terms of live weight gain, feed conversion ratio and performance index by almost same amount of feed intake. On the contrary, blood parameters (Hb, PCV, ESR) were also not affected by the UMMC except for red blood cell and white blood cell counts, but were within their normal range indicating the safe use of UMMC. It was also observed that the UMMC increased (P<0.05) the fecal bacterial population, which might be due to the supplementation of urea in the form of UMMC that enhanced bacterial protein synthesis and contributed in raising body protein level, as well as the growth of the rabbit. In both of the conducted experiment, rabbits fed 6% urea containing UMMC showed better performance than that of the rabbits fed 0, 4 and 8% urea containing UMMC. Considering the economic importance in terms of production cost of UMMC, cost was around 15 Tk. less in each kg of feed than that of the commercial pellets used for rabbit. Thus, the results suggested that the dietary UMMC can be an effective alternative than concentrate feed to improve the productive and reproductive performances of rabbits. 6% urea is the optimum level to be incorporated in UMMC preparation for rabbit. Furthermore, considering the economic significance the dietary UMMC may encourage small and large scale farmers to rear rabbit in a more convenient and profitable way.