Effect of concentrate supplementation on nutrient digestibility and growth of Brahman crossbred cattle fed a basal diet of grass and rice straw

Abstract

BackgroundAn experiment was conducted in Vietnam to test the hypothesis that total dry matter (DM) intake and liveweight (LW) gain would increase in a curvilinear manner with increasing amounts of concentrate offered.MethodThere were five treatments: a basal diet of Guinea grass fed at 1 % of LW and rice straw fed ad libitum (T0), or this diet supplemented with concentrate at 0.6 (T1), 1.2 (T2), 1.8 (T3), or 2.4 % of LW (T4). The concentrate comprised locally available ingredients, namely cassava chips, rice bran, crushed rice grain, fishmeal, salt, and urea, mixed manually.ResultsConcentrate intake increased from T0 to T3, but there was no difference in concentrate intake between T3 and T4. Total feed intake increased in a curvilinear manner from 4.0 to 6.4 kg DM/d as the quantity of concentrate consumed increased. The substitution of concentrate for grass and rice straw increased with increasing consumption of concentrate and was as high as 0.49 kg DM reduction per kg of concentrate consumed. LW gain increased curvilinearly, with significant differences between T0 (0.092 kg/d), T1 (0.58 kg/d) and T2 (0.79 kg/d); but there were no significant differences in LW gain between T2, T3 (0.83 kg/d) and T4 (0.94 kg/d).With increasing amount of concentrate in the diet, the digestibilities of dry matter, organic matter, crude protein, and crude fat increased, but NDF digestibility decreased.ConclusionBased on these results, young Vietnamese Brahman-cross growing cattle will respond to a locally-sourced concentrate mix offered at a level of up to 1.2 % of LW.

Influence of levels of supplementary concentrate mixture on lactation performance of Red Sokoto does and the pre-weaning growth rate of their kids

“…The calculated substitution rates of 0.21, 0.30 and 0.05 g DM decrease in grass hay consumption per 1 g DM increase in concentrate intake by the goats in the treatments 1.5%C, 2.0%C and 2.5%C, respectively, show that there was substitution effect consistent with similar observation by Doyle (1987) . However, the rates are comparable to the modest rates ranging from 0.1 to 0.5 earlier reported for cattle fed varying levels of concentrate supplements ( Quang et al. , 2015 ).…”

Assessment of the nutritive value of corn stover and king grass in complete feed on Ongole steer calves productivity

“…Supplementation with by-products of local crops such as rice bran and legume leaves increases feed intake and digestibility. Corn stover without supplementation has been reported to increases cattle weight by 0.55 kg/cow/day, whereas supplementation with rice bran and legume leave increases it by 0.77 kg/cow/day [4,5].…”

Characterization of Smallholder Beef Cattle Production System in Central Vietnam–Revealing Performance, Trends, Constraints, and Future Development

“…Farming in the Central Region is constrained by many characteristics such as low fertility sandy soils and harsh climatic conditions characterized by long and hot dry season and shorter rainy season (Parsons et al, 2013;Dung et al, 2015). The characteristic of beef cattle production system in Central Vietnam is low-input and small-scale enterprises (Quang et al, 2015). Smallholder cattle production has traditionally relied on extensive grazing, supplemented by the use of crop residues especially rice straw.…”