Herbage intake and animal performance of cattle grazing dwarf elaphant grass with two access times to a forage peanut area

Diego Melo De Liz,Camila Zardo De Nardi,Edison Xavier Almeida,Ederson Americo De Andrade,Henrique Mendonça Nunes Ribeiro Filho,Marcolino Frederico Miguel

doi:10.1590/s1413-70542014000600010

Abstract

Relatively short grazing periods in a pure legume pasture can be an alternative for increasing animal performance in medium-quality tropical pastures. Thus, the aim was to evaluate the herbage intake and animal performance of steers grazing dwarf elephant grass (Pennisetum purpureum Schum. cv. BRS Kurumi) with two access times [2 h (07:00 - 9:00) and 6 h (07:00 - 13:00)] to an area of forage peanut (Arachis pintoi cv. Amarillo). Twelve steers (219 ± 28.8 kg LW) were divided into four groups and assessed during three consecutive grazing cycles, from January to March 2013. The crude protein and neutral detergent fiber contents were 158 and 577 g/kg dry matter (DM) for dwarf elephant grass and 209 and 435 g/kg DM for forage peanut, respectively. The pre-grazing height and leaf mass of dwarf elephant grass and forage peanut were 94 cm and 2782 kg DM/ha and 15 cm and 1751 kg DM/ha, respectively. The herbage intake (mean = 2.7 ± 0.06% LW) and average daily weight gain (mean = 1.16 ± 0.31 kg/day) were similar for both treatments. However, animals with 2-h access to the legume paddock grazed for 71% of the time, whereas those with 6-h access grazed for 48% of the time. The performance of the steers that were allowed to graze forage peanut pasture for 2 h is similar to that of those that were allowed to graze the legume pasture for 6 h.

Highlights

The inclusion of legumes in tropical pastures may result in economic, environmental, and zootechnical advantages
The metabolizable energy (ME) of diets was estimated on the basis of the ME content of the dwarf elephant grass and forage peanut pastures and their proportion in the herbage consumed for each group of animals
The chemical composition and the energy value of the dwarf elephant grass and of the forage peanut were similar for both treatments (Table 1)

Summary

Introduction

The inclusion of legumes in tropical pastures may result in economic, environmental, and zootechnical advantages. The treatments consisted of two daily access periods [2 h (07:00–9:00) and 6 h (07:00–13:00)] to an area of pure forage peanut for animals grazing pure dwarf elephant grass or mixed dwarf elephant grass × forage peanut pastures.

Results

Conclusion