Growth Performance of Male Rabbits Exposed to Dietary Fumonisin

An experiment was conducted in a completely randomised design to evaluate growth response of male rabbits fed fumonisin contaminated diets for 28 weeks. 48 weaned rabbits with average weight of 757±50.50g were randomly allotted to four dietary treatments containing 0.1, 5.0, 7.5 and 10.0 ppm fumonisin B1 (FB1), constituting diets 1 (control), 2, 3 and 4 respectively. The results showed that final cumulative live weight and daily weight gain of the animals were significantly depressed (P<0.05) in rabbits fed 7.5 and 10.0 ppm FB1 to about 88.11% and 85.27% respectively, relative to the mean daily weight gain of 7.74g of those that fed the control diet. Feed consumption of rabbits fed diets 2, 3 and 4 apparently declined to about 95.92, 91.51 and 84.77% respectively relative to the mean dry matter intake of the control rabbits. Feed conversion ratio was significantly (P<0.05) lowered in animals fed control diet compared to those that fed the test diets. Percents mortality of 8.33 and 16.67 were recorded in rabbits that fed 7.5 and 10.0 ppm FB1 respectively as compared to no mortality among the animals that fed diets 2 and the control. Dry matter and crude protein digestibility were depressed (P<0.05) in rabbits fed 7.5 and 10.0 ppm FB1. The results suggest that exposure of rabbits to diet formulated with ingredient contaminated with fumonisin B1 up to 5.0ppm and above will depress growth performance and impair nutrient digestibility in rabbits. Keywords : Dietary Fumonisin, Growth response, Rabbits