The focus of this study was to evaluate the effects of
feeding pigs soya bean meal (SBM) replaced
blood meal (BM) diets on external eostrus signs,
hormonal profile and pre-weaning performance of FI
piglets. Blood was collected from apparently healthy
cattle at slaughter; boiled, sun dried and used to
formulate starter and finisher diets (T1, T2, T3 and
T4). The diets contained 0.00 (T1, control), 50.00
(T2), 75.00 (T3) and 100.00% (T4) BM as replacement for
SBM, respectively. Twenty four Landrace ×
Large White crossbred pigs with a mean weight of 12.24
kg and age range of 6.0 to 6.5 weeks were
randomly allotted to the four treatment groups. The
pigs were maintained on their group specific diet
at 5.0% average body weight as ration until they were
mated. At 6.5 months of age, the gilts were
observed two times daily for symptoms of eostrus.
Following the manifestation of eostrus signs,
scoring for the vulva changes was carried out and
values obtained were compared between treatment
groups at first, second and third eostrus cycles. On
second day of forth eostrus cycle, one gilt from
each group (n=16) was randomly selected and bled every
30 min for 6 hours. The sera obtained was
used to determine hormonal profile using ELISA
technique. After blood collection, the twenty four pigs
were crossed and fed 20.20, 2.00 and 2.50 kg feed per
day at first, second and third stages of
gestation and additional 0.20 kg feed per piglet
farrowed at lactation. Litter size, daily weight gain,
weaning size and weight of the FI offspring were
determined. Results showed that age at puberty,
duration of standing reflex, intensity of reddening,
and swelling of the vulva and eostrus cycle length
showed no significant (p > 0.05) difference to the
control. Whereas duration of standing reflex
increased, intensity and duration of reddening and
swelling of vulva rather decreased with eostrus
cycle number in all the groups. The hormonal assay
showed that estradiol-17β levels of groups T2, T3
and T4 were significantly (p < 0.05) higher than the
control. The BM inclusion had no significant (p >
0.05) effect on Luteinizing and Follicle Stimulating
Hormonal profiles of the gilts, but pulsatile release
at the 3rd and 6th hours was evident. There was no
significant (p > 0.05) difference in performance
indices of the F1piglets, although those fed 75% BM
diet tended to have performed better than others.
It was concluded that inclusion of locally processed BM
in pigs' diets under tropical humid conditions
is safe and does not interfere negatively with some key
reproductive parameters of primigravid
crossbred pigs and pre-weaning performance of their F1
offspring.
Author
(s) Details
Abonyi,
Festus Otaka
Department of Animal Health and Production,
University of Nigeria, Nsukka, Nigeria.
View Book :- http://bp.bookpi.org/index.php/bpi/catalog/book/267
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