Performance of West African Dwarf (WAD) Goats Fed Raw or processed pigeon pea (Cajanus cajan) seed meal based diets.

Abstract

A study was carried out to evaluate the effect of processing methods of pigeon pea seeds on the performance and carcass quality of goats using 16 weaner West African Dwarf (WAD) goats fed diets containing 15% raw (RPBD), soaked (SPBD), toasted (TPBD) and boiled (BPBD) pigeon pea seed meal. The experiment which lasted for 60 days was laid out in a completely randomized design using diets as treatments. The four diets had same percentage inclusion of every ingredient including pigeon pea seed meal which differed only in process form. Results showed that final weight, total weight, daily weight gain and feed conversion ratio differed significantly (P<0.05) among treatment groups. Goats fed boiled pigeon pea based diet (BPBD) had significantly (P<0.05) heavier final weight (10.87kg) than those fed toasted (8.25kg), soaked (7.56kg) and raw (7.25kg) pigeon pea diets. Total weight gain (kg) followed similar pattern as the final weight with the following values obtained for boiled (4.62kg), toasted (2.13kg), soaked (1.56kg) and raw (1.19kg) pigeon pea seed based diets. BPBD had the least feed conversion ratio relative to other diets. However, total and daily feed consumption did not differ (P>0.05) among treatment groups. The best dressing out percent of 58.07% was obtained for the boiled PBD which differed significantly (P<0.05) from values obtained for goats fed raw (33.05%), soaked (36.96%) and toasted (38.72%) pigeon pea based diets. The least cost per kilogram weight gain was obtained for goats fed BPBD (N300), while the highest (N996.15) was from goats fed RPBD. Carcass / organ evaluation showed that warm carcass, loin, set, lungs, kidney and bone to lean ratio were significantly affected by the dietary treatments, and BPBD gave highest values for all except in kidney, liver and bone to lean ratio. The results above suggest that pigeon pea seed can be used generally to improve performance in WAD goats. However, BPBD promoted superior weight gain and dressing percentage, least production cost and FCR as well as superior carcass characteristics relative to raw, toasted and soaked pigeon pea based diets.