Abstract
Feeding management in dairy animals is crucial for ensuring optimal production apart from making the farming as a whole, a more sustainable activity. In our study we evaluated the production and environmental effects of two different feeding regimens i.e., one dominated by traditional cottonseed meal (CSM) and other with coated urea (slow release urea - SRU) as a replacement for CSM on dairy buffalo production. The SRU at 2% level was evaluated by conducting two different trials using twelve lactating Murrah buffaloes and four adult Murrah buffalo bulls. Neither diet nor dry period management showed any substantial effect on milk components, intakes, nutrients’ digestibility coefficients, and nutritive values. The SRU diet revealed increased (P < 0.01) rumen pH, ammonia nitrogen, volatile fatty acids, and microbial nitrogen yield, which were interacted with time of post-prandial sampling. The dynamics of nitrogen metabolism revealed unaltered N-based parameters, except for degradable-N intake and serum urea-N at 3 hr post-feeding. The CSM replacements did not influence (P > 0.05) the residual feed intake, but led to an enhanced milk retention efficiency of nitrogen, calcium, and phosphorus contents, thus reducing their impact on soil pollution and eutrophication of water bodies. Despite an unaltered (P > 0.05) enteric methane emission, SRU diets achieved in decreasing manure methane and nitrous oxide emission. Furthermore, the virtual water flow and lifecycle assessment revealed a water sparing effect and low carbon foot print per unit milk production. In summary, the CSM replacements with SRU could achieve an economical and eco-friendly production system from animal nutrition perspective.
Highlights
Feeding management in dairy animals is crucial for ensuring optimal production apart from making the farming as a whole, a more sustainable activity
Though most of the environmental footprint studies with respect to livestock production are related to cattle rearing, very few studies were conducted on environmental impact assessment of dairy buffalo production and it was estimated that about 5.07 kg of CO2 eq are produced per kg of normalised buffalo milk, a value five times higher than that produced by dairy cow farms[6]
Feeding the milch buffaloes with cottonseed meal (CSM) alone or a mixture with CSM as a major constituent is customary in Indian subcontinent
Summary
Feeding management in dairy animals is crucial for ensuring optimal production apart from making the farming as a whole, a more sustainable activity. Though most of the environmental footprint studies with respect to livestock production are related to cattle rearing, very few studies were conducted on environmental impact assessment of dairy buffalo production and it was estimated that about 5.07 kg of CO2 eq are produced per kg of normalised buffalo milk, a value five times higher than that produced by dairy cow farms[6] Another aspect of buffalo farming with a potentially high environmental impact is manure management[7]. CSM availability is seasonal coupled with unpredictability of cost apart from competition from other species farming like poultry and swine In this regard, replacement of CSM by coated urea (CU), a non-protein-nitrogen (NPN) compound provides various advantages with respect to total cost for production, and CSM sparing effect for the meal usage in poultry, swine industry apart from being an indirect source of protein to animal. Since CSM replacement by CU is being viewed as one of the potential options due to above described reasons, we aim at comprehensive comparative analysis of the eco-sustainability trade-offs with respect to these two different feeding regimens
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