Growth Performance, Feeding Behavior and Physiological Responses of Young Growing Holstein Male Calves to Dietary Chromium-Methionine (Cr-Met) Supplementation Related to Body Weight and Age

This study was conducted to investigate the effect of dietary chromium-methionine (Cr-Met) supplementation on growth performance, feeding behavior and physiological responses of Holstein male calves during two different phases of body weight (BW). Twenty six (153.5±9.83 kg of BW) male calves were divided in two groups (n=13) and randomly assigned to treatments: 1) control and 2) Cr-Met (1.1 mg Cr/kg of diet on a dry matter (DM) basis). Each phase consisted of 1 week pen acclimatization, 3 weeks diet adaptation and 1 week sample collection. After the first phase, all calves received the basal diet (without Cr-Met) for 6 weeks. After this period, the second phase started (240.1±12.15 kg BW). During the second phase treatments changed between 2 groups. Calves fed with Cr-Met diet had lower DM intake and average daily gain (P