effect of physical form of diet on performance of fattening holstein male calves

in order to study the effect of dietary physical form on the fattening performance of holstein male calves, an experiment was conducted in animal science research institute of iran in 2011. the experimental diets were formulated and prepared with two physical forms including total mixed ration (tmr) and densified complete feed block (dcfb). in a completely randomized block design, with two treatments and four blocks (initial weight of the animals), 24 holstein male calves were fed with either of the tmr or dcfb rations. during a five month feeding trial, the animals fed ad-libitum where feed intake, body weight gain and feed conversion ratio were recorded. the average feed intake were 8.1 and 8.4 kg for tmr and dcfb that were significantly (p