Response of doe rabbits to dietary antioxidant vitamins E and C during pregnancy and lactation.

A seven-treatment experiment was carried out to evaluate the response to dietary supplementation with the antioxidant vitamins α-tocopheryl acetate (vitamin E) and ascorbic acid (vitamin C), provided individually or in a combination, on some performance traits of 49 two-year old multiparous New Zealand White (NZW) doe rabbits during pregnancy and lactation. Does were equally assigned to one of the following supranutritional levels of the two vitamins: 1) Control of no supplement (40 mg Vit. E/kg diet); 2) 80 mg Vit. E/kg (E80); 3) 160 mg Vit. E/kg (E160); 4) 200 mg Vit. C/kg (C200); 5) 400 mg Vit. C/kg (C400); 6) 80 mg Vit.E+200 mg Vit. C/kg (E80C200); and 7) 160 mg Vit. E+400 mg Vit. C/kg (E160C400). Results indicate that vitamin C groups C400, then, alternately C200 or E80C200 with a few exceptions were ranked first, second and third as had the highest values for feed intake during pregnancy (P<0.01), and lactation (P<0.05), litter size at birth (P<0.01) and weaning (P=0.08), litter weight at birth (P<0.01) and weaning (P<0.05), and milk production at the 1 (P<0.01), 2 (P=0.06), 3 (P<0.01) and 4 (P<0.01) week of lactation. The eminent exception was that E80 group came second for litter weight at weaning. Conversely, the E160 and E160C400 treatments negatively affected these traits. Plasmatic concentrations of α-tocopherol and ascorbate, the total antioxidant capacity during lactation, and hematological parameters (PCV % and Hb concentration) were increased (P<0.01), especially as the vitamin level was increased either individually or in a combination. In conclusion, it is recommended to boost the diets of pregnant and lactating doe rabbits with extra doses of vitamin C either individually or combined to αtocopherol at low doses to improve the performance traits during these critical periods.