For ruminants, the microbial population existing in the rumen breaks down feed ingredients offered to the animal. This population must be healthy and viable to permit maximum utilization of feed ingredients. Because ruminants evolved mainly as forage feeders, factors that disrupt population of cellulolytic microorganisms will result in reduced utilization of nutrients -primarily, energy and pro...

Selection for the wide range of traits for which most beef breed associations calculate expected progeny differences focus on increasing the outputs of the production system, thereby increasing the genetic potential of cattle for reproductive rates, weights, growth rates, and end-product yield. Feed costs, however, represent a large proportion of the variable cost of beef production and genetic...

This study aimed to evaluate the effects of diet containing the green macroalgae, Ulva lactuca, on the growth performance, feed utilization and body composition of African catfish Clarias gariepinus. Four experimental diets were formulated: D1 as a control group and D2, D3 and D4 which included 10%, 20% and 30% U. lactuca meal, respectively. 180 African catfish, weighing 9.59 ± 0.43 g, and with...

Modern intensive livestock and poultry production has achieved phenomenal gains in the efficient and economical production of high quality and safe animal products and by-products. Furthermore, the overall performance of livestock can be increased by improving nutrients utilization, health status, fertility and efficiency of production. The use of feed additives has been an important part of ac...

In addition to dose-response studies, modeling of N utilization, depending on intake of the first limiting amino acid in the diet, is one of the tools for assessing amino acid requirements in growing animals. Based on a verified nonlinear N-utilization model and following the principles of the diet dilution technique, N-balance experiments were conducted to estimate the Thr requirement of fast-...

Cassava contributes significantly to the nutrition and livelihood of up to 500 million people and thousands of processors and traders around the world. Besides serving as the primary staple food of millions of people in the tropics and subtropics, it can also be used as a carbohydrate source in animal feed. Cassava is used as a raw material in the manufacture of processed food, animal feed and ...

in this study, fish meal (fm) was replaced by the black soldier fly maggot meal (bsfm) with replacement levels at 0%, 25%, 50%, 75% and 100%. the feeding trial was conducted for 56 days and the effect of each replacement level on the growth performance, feed utilization, body composition and survival of the experimental fish was assessed. all the experimental diets were well accepted by the fis...

variation in growth, feed utilization and survival was assessed in sturgeon fingerlings of beluga fed different dietary lipid levels. all diets were iso-nitrogenous (protein = 45%) comprising 3.4-3.7 kcal digestible energy g-1. triplicate groups of 35 fingerling beluga with a mean initial wet weight of 2.14 ± 0.07 g (± sd) were fed with four experimental diets containing 6.7, 10.5, 14 and 17% c...