EFFECTS OF MAIZE GRAIN ADDED IN A DIET BASED ON ALFALFA HAYLAGE ON THE RATION QUALITY IN WETHER SHEEP

• Main Authors: Marina Vranić, Mladen Knežević, Krešimir Bošnjak, Goran Perčulija, Josip Leto, Hrvoje Kutnjak, Martina Horg
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Faculty of Agrobitechnical Sciences Osijek 2011-06-01
• Series: Poljoprivreda
• Subjects: alfalfa haylage; maize grain; intake; digestibility
• Online Access: http://161.53.194.251/~poljo/upload/publications/poljoprivreda-17-1-12.pdf
• ISSN: 1330-7142; 1848-8080

The objective of this experiment was to study the effects of interactions between alfalfa haylage (AH) and maize grain (MG) (5 vs. 10 g d-1 kg-1 body weight) on ad libitum intake, water intake and dry matter (DM) digestibility in wether sheep. The AH and MG contained 534.7 and 915.1g DM kg-1 fresh sample respectively, while crude protein (CP) concentration was 141 and 106.0 g kg-1DM. Adding of MG (5 or 10 g kg-1 body weight d-1) into AH based ration resulted in linear increase in diet DM intake (g kg-1 M0,75), linear decrease in water intake (P<0.01) and linear increase in diet DM digestibility (P<0,001). A positive associative response of MG supplementation to AH based ration was observed for DM intake (P<0.001) and DM digestibility (P<0.001). No improvements in DM intake were recorded with 10 g MG added kg-1 body weight d-1 in comparison with 5 g MG added kg-1 body weight d-1.