Italian Journal of Animal Science (Dec 2022)

Effects of enzymolytic soybean meal on the growth performance, digestive enzyme activity, some serum indexes, carcase performance and meat quality of Rex rabbits

  • Fangen Kong,
  • Fengyang Wu,
  • Yanhua Liu,
  • Ningjie Lai,
  • Guozhou Wang,
  • Shuaifeng Shen,
  • Shuaijuan Han,
  • Bin Li,
  • Yongwei Zhi,
  • Saijuan Chen,
  • Baojiang Chen

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1080/1828051X.2022.2109521
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 21, no. 1
pp. 1307 – 1314

Abstract

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The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of enzymolytic soybean meal (ESBM) on growth performance, digestive enzyme activity, serum biochemical parameters, immunity, carcase performance and meat quality of Rex rabbits. One hundred and twenty healthy weaned Rex rabbits were randomly divided into four groups (30 replicates per group and one rabbit per replicate). The control group was fed the basal diet and the ESBM treated groups (T1, T2 and T3) were fed 0.5%, 1% and 1.5% ESBM instead of the equivalent amount of soybean meal (SBM) in the basal diet, respectively. The study lasted 61 days, including a pre-feeding period of 5 days and a formal trial period of 56 days. Compared with the control group, the feed to weight ratio was significantly decreased in both T2 and T3 groups (p 0.05). In conclusion, the replacement of SBM with ESBM (1.5%) in the diet can reduce the feed to weight ratio, increase the activity of some digestive enzymes, improve carcase performance, and enhance immunity of Rex rabbits.HIGHLIGHTS ESBM improved growth performance, gastrointestinal digestive enzyme activity and carcase performance of Rex rabbits. ESBM increased serum lysozyme activity and albumin content of Rex rabbits. ESBM could be used as a new kind of feed additive for Rex rabbits.

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