Sustainable fodder production and optimization of cow feeding rations in the ar-id climate of southern Ukraine

Abstract

In the south of Ukraine, which traditionally belongs to the zone of risky land use due to frequent droughts and the last 10–15 years of steadily progressing global warming, the production of rye silage as a basic feed ingredient is gaining the status of an excellent insurance fund, which is essential in the region's feed production, as it will help to remedy the situation with the shortage of juicy fodder. Optimisation of dairy cow feeding rations during lactation in southern Ukraine involves the use of traditional dietary ingredients (corn silage, alfalfa haylage) and innovative ones (rye silage, wet beer pellets), which is mainly due to climate change in recent years. The research used commonly available methods: zootechnical (setting up experiments, developing feed rations, assessing dairy cattle productivity, milk quality, reproduction rates); biological (morphological and biochemical composition of blood); statistical (biometric processing of data) and economic analysis of the research. Thus, in terms of actual milk yield, amount of milk fat and milk protein for 305 days of lactation, cows of all experimental groups outperformed analogues of the control group (milk yield for 305 days of lactation was 7898.0 l; amount of milk fat and protein – 278.7 and 245.1 kg, respectively) by 1.2–3.3 %, by the amount of milk fat – by 5.1–16.9 % and by the amount of milk protein – by 3.4–10.9 % for 305 days of lactation. It was found that the diets of dairy cows of the experimental groups, which included rye silage in different amounts and wet beer pellets, had a positive effect on reducing the duration of the service period, and hence the duration of the intercalation period by 5.5–27.0 days in animals of the I–IV experimental groups compared to cows of the control group. There was a tendency to increase the content of carotene in the blood serum of animals of the II experimental group by 39.5 %, as well as a significant difference of 72.7 % (P < 0.05) and 81,3% (P < 0.01), respectively, in cows of the III and IV experimental groups compared to the same indicator of the control group, which was 209.6 μg/100 ml.