Growth Performance of Feeding Hydroponic Maize Fodder to Weaner Rabbit

This study was conducted to investigate proximate composition of hydroponic maize fodder (HMF) and the growth performance of weaner rabbits by replacing the concentrate mixture with HMF at 0, 25, 50, 75 and 100% levels in their diet. Forty (40) weaner rabbits were used; the experiment lasted six (6) weeks. The experiment had five (5) treatments and four (4) replications with two (2) weaner rabbits per replication in a Completely Randomized Design (CRD). Data collected were subjected to analysis of variance with the aid of the SPSS package. Results of the proximate composition of HMF showed that dry matter, crude protein, ether extract, crude fibre, ash and NFE had 28.31, 8.75, 4.52, 14.14, 5.23 and 67.36% respectively. Production parameters such as daily weight gain, daily feed intake/head/42 day (g) (DM basis), and feed conversion ratio were studied. T1, T2, and T3 significantly (p< 0.05) improved the final weight of the weaner rabbits (1052.50, 988.33, and 965.00g) respectively, T1 and T2 were significantly (p< 0.05) higher in daily weight gain (9.86 and 9.24g), daily feed intake on DM basis significantly decreases down the treatment. It was concluded that HMF can be incorporated up to 50% in the basal diet of rabbits.