A Comparison of in vitro and in vivo Feed Digestibility by White-Tailed Deer

Abstract

Of great importance to the Virginia Cooperative Wildlife Research Unit and the Southeastern Forest Experiment Station is the use of an in vitro microdigestion procedure as a means of evaluating quality of plants selected by deer. The advantage of the in vitro technique is that it permits rapid, inexpensive analysis of large numbers of samples. Microdigestion data are useful if they are in close agreement with in vivo macrodigestion data. Blaxter (1962) obtained such agreement in studies with domestic sheep.