Economics of Feeding Rice DDGS and Mixture of Wheat Straw and Groundnut Straw to Growing Crossbred Heifers

Abstract

Feeding of growing heifers is generally ignored by the farmers as they do not want to spend their limited recourses during their non-productive growing phase. This deprives heifers of essential nutrients. Present study was planned on twenty-four HF×Kankrej heifers (avg. BW=116.13±4.74kg) and conducted for 168 days to note the effect of feeding rice DDGS and mixture of wheat straw and groundnut straw on feeding cost and feed efficiency. Three different concentrates containing 0%, 20% and 40% rice DDGS (RDDGS) were offered to T1, T2 and T3 group heifers, respectively. Under each group half of the heifers were offered wheat straw and another half a mixture of wheat straw (50%) and groundnut straw (50%). The protein requirement of heifers was fulfilled as per ICAR (2013) feeding standards. Cost of feeding under different treatments was calculated from the records of daily feed consumption and by considering the procurement cost of feeds and fodders. The recorded data was analyzed by RBD factorial design. Daily feed cost (₹/head/d) reduced linearly and significantly (p<0.05) on replacing soyaDOC with RDDGS. Feed cost (₹/kg BW gain) also reduced linearly but there was significant (p<0.05) reduction only when 40% soyaDOC in concentrate was replaced with RDDGS. There was net saving of ₹ 11.91 and ₹ 23.83/kg BW gain on replacing half and full soyaDOC with RDDGS. Daily feed cost (₹/head/d) increased significantly on feeding mixture of groundnut straw and wheat straw but the feed efficiency improved as feed cost (₹/kg BW gain) reduced by 4.74 % in heifers.