Sustainable Livestock Production Through Efficient Use of Crop Residues

Student Classification

Freshman

Faculty Mentor

Uchenna Anele, Ph.D.

Department

Department of Animal Sciences

Document Type

Poster

Publication Date

Spring 2019

Disciplines

Animal Sciences

Abstract

Small- and medium-scale cattle farmers are constantly faced with the challenge of maintaining economic viability in the face of changing seasons and cattle feed. Their dependency on forage resources means that strategies that maximize the use of forage resources as well as minimize inputs while maintaining acceptable levels of cost of beef cattle is the way to go. Combinations of Kudzu, a common invasive species and corn stover were subjected to solid state fermentation with Pleurotus ostreatus and compared with grass hay for their nutritive value using the in vitro gas production technique. Treatments consisted of mixtures of corn stover (C) and Kudzu (K) as 1) 100C:0K, 2) 75C:25K, 3) 50C:50K, 4) 25C:75K, or 5) 0C:100K, fermented for 0, 35 and 77 days. The study was arranged as a 5 x 3 factorial design with 3 replicates. In vitro gas production was measured at 3, 6, 24 and 48 h of incubation using rumen fluid from 2 dairy cows fed standard diet at the CAES University Farm. In vitro gas data were fitted to a non-linear equation to calculate asymptotic gas (M), rate of gas production (k) and lag time (L). Interactions (P

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