The Effect of Symbiotic Drenching Mixture on the Ingestive Behavior, Productive Performance, Blood Biochemical Parameters and Carcass Traits of Growing Rabbits

Abstract

Key words:Rabbits, symbiotic, ingestive behavior, blood biochemical, growth performance.Stressors that originated from intensive housing of young rabbits during the growing period have bad effects on rabbit performance and health status. A total of forty-five apparently healthy New Zealand White rabbits were used to investigate the effect of drenching of symbiotic mixture on the behavior, productive performance, blood biochemistry and carcass criteria of growing rabbits. They were allocated into two groups} 1st: control (n=21) and 2ed treated) (n=24) and both groups were housed under conventional cage system. The treated group was weekly drenched by 40mg/rabbit/day (200g/1000liter) symbiotic mixture which was dissolved in 5ml distilled water, while the control group received only 5ml distilled water through the drench and all solutions were at room temperature. Video recording of behaviors were done weekly, in addition to determination of rabbit's body weight and feed intake. At the end of the experiment 10 rabbits from each group were slaughtered for blood biochemical analysis and carcass traits evaluation. The obtained results revealed that there was a significant increase in body weight and body weight gain of the drenched group than control one, however, the feed intake, feed conversion ratio and performance index were decreased in the treated rabbits. Drenched rabbits have a significant (P≤0.05) higher total proteins, albumin, and globulin and AL/GL ratio than control groups. The behavior of treated animals showed a significant (P≤0.05) increase in feeding duration (min.) and drinking frequency and duration (min.). This study concluded that drenching of growing rabbits a symbiotic mixture results in improvement of their ingestive behavior, performance and blood biochemical parameters.

Current Prospects of Nutraceuticals in Rabbit Productivity and Health – an Updated Review

“…Synbiotics are a synergistic mixture of probiotics and prebiotics, as they support growth and survival of probiotics and boost their health benefits in the gut. Studies proved that dietary synbiotics enhanced growth performance in growing rabbits (Hassanin et al, 2015;Ali and Hassan, 2018;Kurchaeva et al, 2020;Nwachukwu et al, 2021). Kurchaeva et al (2020) reported that dietary synbiotic (1 g/kg diet) enhanced growth performance (BW and BWG), carcass traits (cooled carcass weight and dressing %), meat chemical composition (increased meat protein, Na, Ca, K, and P contents, while reduced meat fat content), meat physical traits (water-holding capacity, moisture binding capacity, fat holding capacity ability, emulsifying ability, and emulsion stability).…”

“…Hashem et al (2021) indicated that dietary nanoencapsulated Alginate-Synbiotic (11 × 10 12 CFU Saccharomyces cerevisiae yeast + 0.15 g Moringa oleifera leaf extract/kg diet) enhanced gut microbiota ecosystem (increased yeast cells and Lactobacillus counts and reduced Salmonella and Coliforms counts in small intestine and cecum) and increased lengths of small intestine and cecum in comparison with control. Ali and Hassan (2018) concluded that administration of synbiotic increased final BW, BWG, serum concentrations of total protein, albumin, and globulin, feeding behaviour duration, drinking behaviour frequency, and drinking behaviour duration of growing rabbits. Moreover, Sarfraz et al (2019) proved that dietary synbiotic (Lactobacillus acidophilus, FOS, and IMO) by doses of 2, 4, or 6 g/100 g diet had a significant hypolipidaemic potential in form of reducing serum concentrations of total cholesterol, triglycerides, LDL, and VLDL levels, whereas HDL level was increased.…”