Sixteen rams (mean age: 13 mo; mean live weight: 40.0 ± 2.4 kg) were randomly allotted to four dietary treatments in a completely randomized design (4 rams per treatment). Diets (dry matter basis) contained 65% concentrate and 35% alfalfa hay (control diet, T1), 35% wheat straw (T2), 35% barley straw (T3) or 35% maize straw (T4). Total-tract apparent digestibility for dry matter, organic matter...

During participatory rural appraisals, farmers at the Lake Victoria basin of Kenya and Uganda identified Striga, stemborer and declining soil fertility as three major constraints to maize production To reduce food insecurity, several innovative integrated technologies to address these constraints have been developed, including push-pull (maize intercropped with Desmodium and surrounded by napie...

Background: Since 1996, genetically modified (GM) crops have been grown on an ever increasing area worldwide. Maize producing a Cry protein from the bacterium Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) was among the first GM crops released for commercial production and it is the only GM crop currently cultivated in Europe. A major part of the regulatory process that precedes the commercial release of GM crops...

This research covered three villages in Kura local Government Area of Kano State. The study described the socio-economic characteristics of maize producers and their production techniques and also determined the profitability and resource use efficiency in the maize production. Structured questionnaires were used for primary data collection and 40 small scale producers were purposively selected...

The bindweeds Calystegia sepium and Convolvulus arvensis are difficult to control chemically. Calystegia sepium is often a problem in maize or in vineyards, while C. arvensis is an important weed of cereals. The biological control of these weeds with insects or fungal pathogens has been investigated since 1970. More than 600 fungi collected in countries throughout Europe have been isolated in o...

Biomass crops are being promoted as environmentally favorable alternatives to fossil fuels or ethanol production from maize (Zea mays L.), particularly across the Corn Belt of the United States. However, there are few if any empirical studies on inorganic N leaching losses from perennial grasses that are harvested on an annual basis, nor has there been empirical evaluation of the hydrologic con...

Maize is frequently infected by the Fusarium species producing mycotoxins. Numerous investigations have focused on grain maize, but little is known about the Fusarium species in the entire plant used for silage. Furthermore, mycotoxins persist during the ensiling process and thus endanger feed safety. In the current study, we analyzed 20 Swiss silage maize samples from growers' fields for the i...

An integrated optimization model was developed for the spatial distribution of agricultural crops in order to efficiently utilize agricultural water and land resources simultaneously. The model is based on the spatial distribution of crop suitability, spatial distribution of population density, and agricultural land use data. Multi-source remote sensing data are combined with constraints of opt...

genetically modified (gm) foods hold the key to ending hunger and malnutrition in africa.   due to the increasing number of gmos cultivation and delay in the approval of biosafety law in nigeria, it has become necessary to screen maize products in order to determine the identity of the consumed daily foodstuffs. in this study, dna extraction from raw and processed maize foods sold commercially ...

in this study, a complex crop model was developed that integrates the various components of swap and csm-ceres-maize (dssat v4.0) model with the purpose of developing a more efficient model and according to the internal requirements. in the hybrid model, ceres-maize supplies swap model with daily leaf area index and root depth and on the other hand swap model supplies ceres-maize with daily wea...