Improving feed efficiency in rabbit production, a review on nutritional, technico-economical, genetic and environmental aspects

Gidenne, Thierry; Garreau, Hervé; Drouilhet, Laurence; Aubert, Claude; Maertens, Luc

doi:10.1016/j.anifeedsci.2017.01.016

Cited by 86 publications

(79 citation statements)

References 42 publications

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“…Therefore, economic efficiency % improved with decreasing of feeding cost through using strategy of feed restriction which gave a beneficial effect of feed efficiency and weight gain (main factors used in calculation of economical efficiency %). This result agreed with recent strategy of Gidenne et al, (2017) who reported that future possibilities for genetic selection for feed efficiency are based on improvements to the residual feed intake and it seems possible to improve feed efficiency further by reducing feed intake without affecting weight gain. Such a genetic improvement would reduce both feed input (reducing costs) and output (reducing environmental impacts).…”

Section: Economical Efficiencysupporting

confidence: 92%

Effect of Feed Restriction System on Performance, Carcass Traits, Meat Quality and Blood Parameters of Growing Rabbits

Abou-Kassem¹

2017

Egyptian Journal of Rabbit Science

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The objective of the present study to investigate the effect of feed restriction system on growing performance, carcass traits, meat quality and blood parameters of growing New Zealand White (NZW) rabbits, during experimental periods from 5 to 13 weeks of age. A total number of 90 NZW rabbits (male and female ratio 1:1) of weaning aged 5 weeks (about 777.45±10.38g body weight) were randomly divided into five experimental groups (n=18 each), the first group was fed ad-libitum as control, the second group was fed restriction a mount of feed for first 2 weeks only, the third group was fed restriction for 4 weeks only, the fourth group was fed restriction 6 weeks only and the fifth group was fed restriction for all experimental period (8weeks). Results showed a significant (P< 0.01) increased of live body weight, weight gain and feed intake in group 1 (ad libitum) as compared with other restricted groups. No significant effect was observed in health status or mortality percentage of rabbits during experimental periods. Renal fat was significantly (P< 0.05) reduced in rabbits restricted as compared with control group. The meat pH was not affected by restriction feed groups. On the other hand blood parameters studied were not significantly influenced by the treatment. Conclusively, it could be concluded that, feed restriction groups of growing rabbits at different ages studied with various mounts can be adopted because it does not interfere negatively in the performance, meat quality and blood parameters. Also it's beneficial in improvement of feed and economic efficiencies.

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Section: Economical Efficiencysupporting

confidence: 92%

Effect of Feed Restriction System on Performance, Carcass Traits, Meat Quality and Blood Parameters of Growing Rabbits

Abou-Kassem¹

2017

Egyptian Journal of Rabbit Science

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“…Thus, feed restriction decreased body N at 55 d (P<0.001), as well as total N ingestion (-3.2%; P<0.05), and daily N excretion (-3.7%; P<0.05) in the whole trial (34-69 d) (Table 6). Similarly, other authors (Gidenne et al, 2013a;Birolo et al, 2016) found that both severe and mild feed restriction rates play a key role in reducing N excretion on rabbit farms due to the higher feed efficiency in comparison with ad libitum feeding.…”

Section: Effect Of Feed Restrictionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Effect of feed restriction and feeding plans on performance, slaughter traits and body composition of growing rabbits

et al. 2017

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Two feeding systems (L, ad libitum vs. R, feed restriction) were combined with 3 feeding plans (MM, MH, HH) to evaluate the effects on performance, slaughter results, body composition and nitrogen balance of 300 commercial crossbred rabbits kept individually from weaning to slaughter (34-70 d of age). The R rabbits were fed from 80% (first days on trial) to 100% (end of 3 rd wk) of ad libitum intake, whereafter R rabbits had free access to feed. The 3 feeding plans were: MM plan, M diet with moderate digestible energy (DE) content, 10.6 MJ/kg, throughout the trial; HH plan, H diet with high DE content, 11.1 MJ/kg, throughout the trial; MH plan, M diet for the first 3 wk and H diet for the last 2 wk. Feed restriction did not affect nutrient digestibility, growth rate on the whole trial and slaughter results, but improved feed conversion (2.96 vs. 2.89 in L and R rabbits, respectively; P<0.01) and reduced N excretion (2.16 vs. 2.07 g excreted N/d, in L and R rabbits; P<0.05). At the end of the first period (55 d), R rabbits showed lower empty body protein, lipid, and gross energy gains than L rabbits, but differences disappeared within the end of the trial. The HH plan improved feed conversion (2.97 vs. 2.89 for MM vs. HH; P<0.05), but increased excreted N (2.03 vs. 2.17 g/d; P<0.001) in comparison with the MM plan due to the higher digestible protein/DE ratio of H diet, whereas the MH plan showed intermediate results. In conclusion, a moderate feed restriction during post weaning improved feed conversion and reduced N excretion without negative effects on growth or slaughter results. Moreover, N excretion was confirmed to depend largely on dietary nitrogen content.

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“…So, feed intake can be collected at an individual level by providing automatic feeding stations, in chickens (Howie, Avendano, Tolkamp, & Kyriazakis, 2011;Howie, Tolkamp, Avendano, & Kyriazakis, 2009) and in pigs (Sánchez et al, 2017) or individually. Feed efficiency, mostly expressed as feed conversion ratio (FCR) or residual feed intake (RFI), is an indicator to judge the financial and environmental performance of a farming system (Barea et al, 2010;Gidenne, Garreau, Drouilhet, Aubert, & Maertens, 2017). Byerly (1941) proposed feed efficiency as such an indicator and shown to have a genetic variability and, therefore, Hess, Byerly, and Jull (1941) proposed it as a selection criterion.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Feed and reproductive efficiency differences between divergently selected lines for birthweight environmental variability in mice

García-Rebollar¹,

Flor²,

Gutiérrez³

et al. 2018

J Animal Breeding Genetics

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Sustainability has come to play an important role in agricultural production. A way to combine efficiency with sustainability might be by searching for robust animals that can be selected for the homogeneity of certain traits. Furthermore, the optimization of feed efficiency is one of the challenges to improve livestock genetics programmes, but this might compromise reproductive efficiency. Animals from two divergent mouse lines, regarding variability of birthweight, were used to check whether homogeneity was also related to both feed and reproductive efficiency. The objective of this study was to use these divergent lines of mice to compare them with their feed efficiency and the reproductive capacity. Animal weight, weight gain, feed intake, relative intake and cumulated transformation index were considered as feed efficiency traits. Animals from the low line had both lower weight and feed intake from 21 to 56 days. They had a worse transforming index in the three last weeks when litter size was fitted as an effect of the model, but the lines become similar if the higher litter size of the low line was not included. Reproductively, the low line performed better considering the number of females having parturitions, the number of parturitions, and with higher litter size and survival in both parturitions. Hence, the low variability line was preferred because of reproductive efficiency without seriously affecting its feed efficiency. Homogeneity seemed to be related to robustness with similar feed efficiency but higher reproductive efficiency.

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Improving feed efficiency in rabbit production, a review on nutritional, technico-economical, genetic and environmental aspects

Cited by 86 publications

References 42 publications

Effect of Feed Restriction System on Performance, Carcass Traits, Meat Quality and Blood Parameters of Growing Rabbits

Effect of Feed Restriction System on Performance, Carcass Traits, Meat Quality and Blood Parameters of Growing Rabbits

Effect of feed restriction and feeding plans on performance, slaughter traits and body composition of growing rabbits

Feed and reproductive efficiency differences between divergently selected lines for birthweight environmental variability in mice

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