Abstract
Agroindustrial co-products are a viable alternative for use in animal nutrition. Tests were conducted using eight different types of co-products and feed to evaluate the chemical composition, in vitro digestibility of dry matter, crude protein and neutral detergent fiber, and gas production by them. The co-products tested were: coffee hulls; pelleted citrus pulp; grape residue; soybean hulls; cottonseed; cassava foliage; and foods usually supplied to ruminants: corn silage and ground corn concentrate. Data of in vitro digestibility of dry matter, crude protein and neutral detergent fiber were tested by analysis of variance using the least square method; the results of gas production were interpreted by a non-linear regression by the Gauss-Newton method; and the effects of treatments were evaluated by the Tukey’s test. The coefficients of in vitro digestibility of dry matter, crude protein and neutral detergent fiber of co-products were different. Gas production was also different between co-products and feeds evaluated for the volume of gas produced from the fast and slow degradation fractions, degradation rate, bacterial colonization time, and the total volume of gas produced. The evaluated co-products exhibited greater in vitro dry matter digestibility compared to corn silage, except for cottonseed, grape residue, and cassava foliage. Co-products showed higher values of in vitro crude protein digestibility compared to corn silage, and a reduced in vitro digestibility of neutral detergent fiber, except for pelleted citrus pulp and soybean hulls. Corn silage produced larger volume of gas from the fast degradation fraction compared to the co-products and corn concentrate. Co-products analyzed had appropriate nutritional characteristics according to the techniques applied and can be included in ruminant diets.
Highlights
Agroindustrial residues resulting from the processing of plant products, such as meals, seeds, pulps and peels, are generated in large quantities and have the potential to be used to feed animals of zootechnical interest (Prado & Moreira, 2002)
Pelleted citrus pulp and ground corn grain presented higher levels of DIVDM, 95.33 and 94.76%, respectively (Table 2). These values were higher than the soybean hulls and the coffee hulls (83.44 and 80.73%, respectively), followed by corn silage (72.67%)
The lowest values of DIVDM were found for samples of cassava foliage, grape residue and cottonseed (53.17, 51.24 and 49.52%, respectively)
Summary
Agroindustrial residues resulting from the processing of plant products, such as meals, seeds, pulps and peels, are generated in large quantities and have the potential to be used to feed animals of zootechnical interest (Prado & Moreira, 2002). The use of in vitro digestibility techniques is convenient in studies on animal nutrition to estimate the quality of food and co-products, since they are simple, fast methods and because they present physical-chemical uniformity of the fermentation site (Alcalde, Machado, Santos, Picolli, & Jobim, 2001). Techniques such as in vivo tests are the most accurate methods for determining the nutritional value of feeds used in animal diets. Several in vitro techniques and laboratory techniques have been developed, such as those proposed by Tilley and Terry (1963); Orskov and Mcdowell (1979); Weiss, Conrad, and Pierre, (1992), and Maurício, Mould, and Dhanoa (1999), with the function of enabling nutritional assessment of foods
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