Abstract
A study was conducted to evaluate the effects of supplementation of a leaf based concentrate consisting of a 1:1 leaf mixture of Vernonia amygdalina and Tithonia diversifolia (VATD) as a direct replacement for brewers dried grains (BDG) on feed intake, growth performance and digestibility by West African Dwarf (WAD) goats on a basal diet of Panicum maximum hay. Twenty five growing WAD goats weighing between 8.07 - 9.60 kg were allotted into five dietary treatment groups in a completely randomized design with five goats per treatment. The mixed leaf meal (VATD) were included in the diets at 0% (T1), 5% (T2), 10% (T3), 15% (T5), and 20% (T5) of the total diet. The experiment lasted for twelve weeks. Results showed that dry matter (DM) intake (g/kg W0.75/day) was lowest (P<0.05) in control diet T1 (72.02), and higher in T3 (92.78) than T2, T4 and T5 (88.69, 86.61 and 86.70, respectively). Crude protein (CP) intake (g/kg W0.75/day) peaked at T3 and progressively reduced thereafter in T4 (15.10), T5 (14.83) and T2 (14.16). CP intake was higher (P<0.05) in T3 than T1. Daily weight gain (g/day) of goats ranged from 32.97 (T4 and T5) to 38.40 (T3). Crude protein digestibility was higher (P<0.05) in T5 (89.49%) than T1 (84.23%) and T4 (84.19%) but similar in T2 (85.47%) and T3 (86.10%). Better nitrogen intake (15.10 g/day) was observed in goats fed T4 compared to those fed T1 (14.32) and T2 (14.16). Rumen pH values were higher in T1 than T2, T3, T4 and T5. Ammonia N content (mg/100ml) of the rumen was similar in goats fed T2 (9.92), T3 (10.07) and T5 (9.80) but higher (P<0.05) than those fed T1 (8.19). The result suggests that WAD goats fed VATD leaf meal based concentrates perform better on diets with levels of mixed concentrates not exceeding 10%. Key words: Growth, Leaf meal, nitrogen utilization, Tithonia diversifolia, Vernonia amygdalina, WAD goats.
Highlights
Utilizing the vast amount of grasslands in Nigeria remains one of the most economical ways to achieve growth in ruminant production
The chemical composition (g/100 g dry matter (DM)) of P. maximum, V. amygdalina, T. diversifolia and compounded diets is shown in Table 1, while Table 2 shows the gross composition (g/100 g DM) of experimental diets
Dry matter values for P. maximum and the browses in the current study are similar to values of 85.37 reported by Odedire and Oloidi (2014) for T. diversifolia, but higher than 78.44 reported for Guinea grass by Okoruwa et al (2014)
Summary
Utilizing the vast amount of grasslands in Nigeria remains one of the most economical ways to achieve growth in ruminant production. These grasses and pastures are deficient in nitrogen and digestible nutrients. For optimum fermentative rumen digestion (VanSoest, 1982) This results in low intake which can be improved by tree fodder supplementation (Topps, 1992; Abdulrazak et al, 2000). According to Kanjanapruthipong and Leng (1998), there was an improvement in the performance of rams fed poor quality grass diets supplemented with Gliricidia maculata at an optimum level of inclusion of 20 - 25%. Tree browses have tremendous potential as supplements to the low quality forages or grass diets fed to goats. Where tannin contents have been reduced through processing to a tolerable level, the tannin may proffer a by-pass characteristic to the protein, making it utilizable by the animal (Aganga and Tshwenyane, 2003; Barry and McNabb, 1999)
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