Abstract
The contemporary environmental-stewardship programmes primarily aimed at curbing the global warming potential by adopting a multidisciplinary approach. Manipulating the feeding strategies has great potential in reducing the environmental footprints of livestock production. This study intends to assess the effect of soybean meal (SBM) replacement with varying levels of coated urea (SRU) on both zoo-technical (nutrient digestibility, heat increment, and physio-biochemical parameters) and environmental attributes. The coated urea was used to replace the SBM at 0, 25, 50, and 75 percent levels. Eight adult rams (43.02 ± 0.76) maintained in a conventional shed were used in a replicated 4 x 4 Latin square design. Not all the physiological parameters viz. rectal temperature, pulse rate, and respiratory rate were affected (P>0.05)f by varying levels of SRU incorporation. The SRU fed animals had higher (P<0.05) crude protein digestibility compared to SBM fed animals; however, the replacements did not affect the nutrient digestibility coefficients of DM, OM, NFC, NDFap, ADF, and hemicellulose components. The SRU did not affect various biochemical parameters such as serum glucose, total protein, albumin, globulin, urea, creatinine, ALT, AST, Ca, P and T3, and T4 levels; however, post-prandial serum urea N (SUN) values showed a diurnal quadratic pattern (P<0.05) with a dose-dependent relationship. Further, the SBM replacements had no effect on the calcium excretion, while the SRU incorporation decreased the faecal phosphorous content, thereby abating the eutrophication phenomenon. Although the SBM replacements did not affect in vivo water variables and faecal solid fractions, they managed to decrease the land and virtual water requirement along with global warming potential (GWP) of the entire trial. The GWP-perceptual map unveils the fact that replacement of conventional feed ingredients with NPN compounds aids in eco-friendly livestock production. Further, the conjectural analysis of the carbon footprint methodology revealed that agricultural by-products consideration could cause a huge increase in the GWP share of feed consumed, thus compelling the importance of research pertaining to feed production perspective as equal as ruminal methane amelioration.
Highlights
In many of the third world countries, sheep farming contributes to the livelihood of the economically weaker sections of society
Different sources of slow release urea viz., Tannin- or Salseed meal- or lignin- or Cacl2- or CaSO4- or Zinc- bound urea; and lipid- or polymer- coated urea exists for usage as animal feed
Urea release from the coated urea collected from rations used in the feeding experiments was 85.68% as compared to that of uncoated urea after 1 h of incubation (S1 File)
Summary
In many of the third world countries, sheep farming contributes to the livelihood of the economically weaker sections of society. Despite having the nutritional benefits, urea feeding has its own limitations, especially in tropical countries since it aggravates the heat stress due to the additional energy cost (7.2 Kcal/g of N) required for metabolism and elimination of excess ammonia produced [4]. This phenomenon may lead to ruminal asynchrony of NH3-N production and availability of energy, causing absorption of ammonia into portal-drained viscera leading to urea synthesis in liver
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