Effect of Feeding Mineral Soil Licks with Concentrates on Apparent Digestibility of Nutrients and Serum Mineral Concentration in Case of Doyogena Sheep

Abstract

The study was carried out to study the effect of different mineral supplements with concentrate on dry matter (DM), organic matter (OM), crude protein (CP), crude fat (CF), neutral-detergent fiber (NDF) and acid-detergent fiber (NDF) in local sheep breed. Three treatment mineral supplements are local mineral soil bole, local mineral soil makaduwa and commercial mineral mix. Twenty four male yearling lambs were divided in to four groups of six animals based on their initial body weight in randomized complete block design. The treatments used were; without mineral supplements (MM), bole ad libitum (BM) and commercial mineral mix (CMM) in 50g/day/head were randomly assigned to each group. Apparent digestibility trail was carried out for 15 days after 21 day quarantine and 15 days acclimatization for experimental environment. Apparent digestibility of DM, OM and CP group of all treatments was significantly higher (P<0.001) than control group. Serum mineral concentration is within normal range for Ca, Mg, Cu and Zn for those fed mineral supplement than control group pointing to the need to identify the underlying causes for this difference and adaptation of sheep to mineral soil efficiency athwart the year

Keywords: Mineral soil, Digestibility, Serum, Doyogena sheep