Nitrogen metabolism in lambs fed diets containing peach palm meal.

The objective of this study was to evaluate the nitrogen metabolism of lambs fed diets containing peach palm meal substituting maize (0, 10, 40, 60, and 85 % DM). Thirty Santa Inês uncastrated lambs with an average initial body weight of 21.6 ± 0.87 kg were distributed in a completely randomized design with five diets and six replicates. The nitrogen (N) intake (g/day, %BW) and the fecal N decreased linearly as the peach palm meal was added to the concentrate. The urinary N, however, responded quadratically, with maxima at the level of 29.97 and 40.44 % of substitution of maize for peach palm meal when expressed in g/day and %BW, respectively. The substitution of maize for peach palm meal reduced the retention of nitrogen and the microbial protein synthesis in the lambs.

Intake, digestibility and performance of lambs fed diets containing peach palm meal.

The aim of this study was to evaluate the intake and apparent digestibility of nutrients, performance, and plasma glucose concentration of ram lambs fed diets containing peach palm meal substituting maize (0, 10, 40, 60, and 85 % dry matter (DM)). Thirty Santa Inês rams with an average initial body weight of 21.6 ± 0.87 kg were distributed in a completely randomized design with five diets and six replicates. The substitution of the maize for the peach palm meal affected (P < 0.05) the intakes of DM, organic matter (OM), crude protein (CP), neutral detergent fiber corrected for ash and protein (NDFap), total carbohydrates (TC), total digestible nutrients (TDN), and metabolizable energy (ME), which decreased linearly (P < 0.05); the intake of ether extract (EE), however, fit an increasing linear equation (P < 0.05). The apparent digestibility coefficients of DM, OM, NDFap, and TC decreased linearly (P < 0.05) as the level of peach palm meal in the concentrate was increased. The total weight gain and the average daily gain decreased by 0.09 and 0.001 kg with each level of substitution of the maize for peach palm meal, respectively. It is recommended to substitute 40 % of the maize for peach palm meal.

Long-term Bias of Internal Markers in Sheep and Goat Digestion Trials.

Two digestion trials, one with sheep and another with goats, were conducted to evaluate the long-term bias (LTB) of the indigestible dry matter (iDM), indigestible neutral detergent fiber (iNDF) and indigestible acid detergent fiber (iADF) internal markers. The study used eight Santa Inês castrated male sheep (average body weight of 16.6 kg) distributed in two 4×4 Latin squares and eight Saanen castrated male goats (average body weight of 22.6 kg) distributed in two 4×4 Latin squares. The experiments were conducted simultaneously, and the animals were housed in 1.2 m(2) individual pens with wood-battened floors equipped with individual feeders and drinkers. The animals received isonitrogenous diets that were offered ad libitum and contained 14% crude protein and 70% sugar cane (with 0, 0.75, 1.5 or 2.25% CaO, in natural matter percentage), corrected with 1% urea and 30% concentrate. The experiment consisted of four experimental periods of 14 d each, with the feed, leftovers and feces sampled on the last four days of each period. The marker concentrations in the feed, leftovers and fecal samples were estimated by an in situ ruminal incubation procedure with a duration 240 h. The relationship between the intake and excretion of the markers was obtained by adjusting a simple linear regression model, independently from the treatment (diets) fixed effects and Latin squares. For both the sheep and goats, a complete recovery of the iDM and iNDF markers was observed (p>0.05), indicating the absence of LTB for these markers. However, the iADF was not completely recovered, exhibiting an LTB of -9.12% (p<0.05) in the sheep evaluation and -3.02% (p<0.05) in the goat evaluation.