Evaluation of Coarsely Ground Wheat as a Replacement for Ground Corn in the Diets of Lactating Dairy Cows

Eight multiparous Holstein cows (569±47 kg of BW; 84±17 DIM) were used to evaluate the effects of different levels of coarsely ground wheat (CGW) as replacements for ground corn (GC) in diets on feed intake and digestion, ruminal fermentation, lactation performance, and plasma metabolites profiles in dairy cows. The cows were settled in a replicated 4×4 Latin square design with 3-wk treatment periods; four cows in one of the replicates were fitted with rumen cannulas. The four diets contained 0, 9.6, 19.2, and 28.8% CGW and 27.9, 19.2, 9.6, and 0% GC on dry matter (DM) basis, respectively. Increasing dietary levels of CGW, daily DM intake tended to increase quadratically (p = 0.07); however, apparent digestibility of neutral detergent fiber (NDF) and acid detergent fiber (ADF) were significantly decreased (p<0.01) in cows fed the 28.8% CGW diets. Ruminal pH remained in the normal physiological range for all dietary treatments at all times, except for the 28.8% CGW diets at 6 h after feeding; moreover, increasing dietary levels of CGW, the daily mean ruminal pH decreased linearly (p = 0.01). Increasing the dietary levels of CGW resulted in a linear increase in ruminal propionate (p<0.01) and ammonia nitrogen (NH3-N) (p = 0.06) concentration, while ruminal acetate: propionate decreased linearly (p = 0.03) in cows fed the 28.8% CGW diets. Milk production was not affected by diets; however, percentage and yield of milk fat decreased linearly (p = 0.02) when the level of CGW was increased. With increasing levels of dietary CGW, concentrations of plasma beta-hydroxybutyric acid (BHBA) (p = 0.07) and cholesterol (p<0.01) decreased linearly, whereas plasma glucose (p = 0.08), insulin (p = 0.02) and urea nitrogen (p = 0.02) increased linearly at 6 h after the morning feeding. Our results indicate that CGW is a suitable substitute for GC in the diets of dairy cows and that it may be included up to a level of 19.2% of DM without adverse effects on feed intake and digestion, ruminal fermentation, lactation performance, and plasma metabolites if the cows are fed fiber-sufficient diets.