Published in Scientific Papers. Series "Management, Economic Engineering in Agriculture and rural development", Vol. 21 ISSUE 1
Written by Adelani Abayomi ADEOYE, Bababunmi Alaba AJAYI, Jessie Ezekiel UDOH

Lack of conventional weighing scales in the rural areas makes the use of body measurements to predict live body weight in rabbits an important study. The objective of this study were to: examine the effects of sex on body weight and other growth traits at eight (8) week, to determine the phenotypic correlations between the body weight and linear body measurements and to predict live body weight of the rabbits using linear body measurements. Measurements were taking on body weight, body length, ear length, tail length, fore arm length, heart girth and abdominal circumference from 61 females and 39 males of American Standard Chinchilla rabbits. The results show that, the values for body weight, body length, ear length, tail length, fore arm length, heart girth and abdominal circumference for female were 1.19 ± 0.02, 31.97 ± 0.25, 10.67 ± 0.13, 9.89 ± 0.19, 15.61 ± 0.14, 21.61 ± 0.17 and 23.75 ± 0.14 respectively, while the corresponding values for male were 0.88 ± 0.04, 28.00 ± 0.37, 10.44 ± 0.25, 8.95 ± 0.14, 14.74 ± 0.17, 19.62± 0.20 and 21.67 ± 0.29. Means were statistically higher (p<0.05) in the female compared with male in virtually all the traits considered except in fore arm length. The correlations between body weight and the linear body measurements ranged between -0.011 to 1.000 in the overall population. It is significant in most cases, except in body weight and ear length (-0.156), body weight and face length (- 0.011), heart girth and ear length (-0.046), abdominal circumference and ear length (-0.235). Others are: face length and heart girth (-0.086) and face length and abdominal circumference (-0.216). Coefficient of determination was highest when body length was fitted in the model. When two variables were included in the model highest coefficient of determination was observed in body length and ear length. When all the variables were fitted, the coefficient of determination was the highest. Increased variables in the model showed that, the coefficient of determination also increased. The best predictor of live body weight at eight weeks in American Standard Chinchilla rabbits was body length.

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