Performance of growing and finishing dairy bulls offered diets based on whole-crop barley silage with or without protein supplementation relative to a grass silage-based diet

Arto Kalevi Huuskonen

doi:10.23986/afsci.8558

Abstract

This study was conducted to examine the performance of growing dairy bulls offered diets based on whole-crop barley silage with or without protein supplementation when compared to a grass silage-based diet. A feeding experiment comprised 36 bulls which were fed a total mixed ration ad libitum. The four dietary treatments were: 1) grass silage (600 g kg-1 dry matter) and rolled barley (400), 2) whole-crop barley silage (600) and rolled barley (400), 3) whole-crop barley silage (600), rolled barley (310) and rapeseed meal-based protein supplementation (90), and 4) whole-crop barley silage (600), rolled barley (330) and rapeseed meal + urea -based protein supplementation (70). Replacing grass silage with whole-crop barley decreased the carcass gain and carcass weight of the bulls due to lower energy intake. Protein supplementation either as rapeseed meal or rapeseed meal + urea of whole-crop barley silage based diets had no effects on animal performance.

Highlights

IntroductionMost of the forage for growing cattle in Finland is based on silage mixtures of different grasses, timothy (Phleum pratense), meadow fescue (Festuca pratensis), tall fescue (Festuca arundinacea) and red clover (Trifolium pratense)
Most of the forage for growing cattle in Finland is based on silage mixtures of different grasses, timothy (Phleum pratense), meadow fescue (Festuca pratensis), tall fescue (Festuca arundinacea) and red clover (Trifolium pratense).other ensiled forages, such as different whole-crop silages, are increasingly being used due to their potentially lower costs
The digestibility of whole-crop silages is highly dependent on the proportion of straw and is often lower than that of good quality grass silage but the lower digestibility is largely compensated for by higher dry matter intake (DMI) (Abdalla et al 1999, Sinclair et al 2003, Huhtanen et al 2007)

Summary

Introduction

Most of the forage for growing cattle in Finland is based on silage mixtures of different grasses, timothy (Phleum pratense), meadow fescue (Festuca pratensis), tall fescue (Festuca arundinacea) and red clover (Trifolium pratense). Other ensiled forages, such as different whole-crop silages, are increasingly being used due to their potentially lower costs. In Finland, barley (Hordeum vulgare) is the dominant small-grain species utilized for whole-crop production, but oats (Avena sativa) and wheat (Triticum aestivum) are used. In a review of seven experiments with finishing beef cattle Keady et al (2013) concluded that the inclusion of whole-crop wheat silage in grass silage-based diets increased forage intake by 1.4 kg DM d-1, but did not alter animal performance

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