Utilization of the gas test method and horse faeces as a source of inoculum

Abstract

The gas test is commonly described as a simple, rapid and cheap technique for predicting the energy value of forages but it requires animals fitted with a canula. In horses, this method can be implemented with caecal fluid as an inoculum to predict the organic matter digestibility (OMD) of forages (Macheboeuf et al., 1998). In the present work, as bacterial content of faeces was known to be very high (Meyer et al., 1993), the use of faeces as a source of inoculum for predicting OMD of forages in horses was studied.