Abstract

Twenty- four (24) sexually mature (Chinchilla) rabbit bucks were used to evaluate the effect of feeding different combination of Panicum maximum, Calapogonium mucunoides and concentrate on the libido and sperm production in rabbit bucks. The Panicum maximum was fed to the rabbits bucks as fellows Tl 50%, T2 50%, T3 35% & T4 30%, Calapogonium was fed as follows Tl 50%, T2 45%, T3 55% & T4 55% while the concentrate was as follows TI 0%, T2 5%, T3 10% and T4 15% and semen samples were collected and analyzed. Results obtained showed that there was significant difference (P < 0.05) between the treatments on the semen concentration. Semen concentration tended to increase in the rate of concentrate inclusion in the rabbit diet, with T4 having the highest value of (275x10) and TI has the lowest value of (241x10") sperm motility values obtained were recorded as 66.67%, 61.67%, 71.67 % and 73.33% for Tl, T2, T3 and T4 respectively. Sperm live proportion was 76.00% for Tl, 77.33% for T2 while T3 was 81.33% and T4 was 80.33% . The following values were recorded for sperm volume 0.63ml for Tl, T2 is 0.60ml, T3 0.73ml and 0.80ml for T4 while abnormal sperm was 2.33%, 1.67%, 1.03% and 1.03% for Tl,T2,T3 and T4 respectively . For the growth parameters T3 and T4 were seen to be significantly (P < 0. 05) lower than T2 but similar to Tl values. It was finally concluded from this study that concentrate is good for rabbit bucks as it increases their libido performance and so it is recommended that concentrate should be given to the breeding bucks at the rate of 15% of dietary dry matter on daily basis so as to improve their reproductive performance