Replacing starch with digestible fibre in growing rabbit feeding

To evaluate the effect of replacing dietary starch with digestible fibre (DF=pectin and hemicelluloses) on health status, digestive physiology, growth performance, and carcass traits, 250 hybrid rabbits weaned at 27 d were fed until slaughter (76 d) five diets with increasing DF to starch ratio (1.0 to 1.9; DF 18.9 to 22.2%; starch 19.6 to 11.5%). The digestibility of dry matter (64.7, 65.2, 66.8, 67.5 and 67.6%) and NDF (27.9, 32.2, 35.0, 40.2 and 41.5%) increased (probability of linear component of variance, L<0.001) with increasing DF to starch ratio. Final live weight and daily growth tended to decrease (L=0.06), feed intake significantly lowered (130 to 122 g/d, L=0.01) and feed conversion ratio improved (2.72 to 2.68; L<0.01). Health status, caecal fermentation and ileal mucosa traits of rabbits did not change. The feeding strategy failed in controlling the diffusion of epizootic rabbit enteropathy.