Forage intake and weight gain of ewes is affected by roughage mixes during winter in northeastern China

Authors:
Publisher website
Google Scholar
Abstract
We studied the effect of dietary roughage species and their combinations on forage intake and growth rate of ewes during winter in a pastoral‐farming area of northeast China. Twenty‐five Northeast crossbred ewes (fine‐wool sheep × Small‐tailed Han sheep) were randomly selected and divided into five groups (G1, G2, G3, G4 and G5). During a 30 day feeding trial, each group of ewes were offered the same basal diet (composed of 0.36 kg chopped maize stalk (10 mm), 0.14 kg corn meal, 0.05 kg soybean meal and 1.2 g NaCl) and one of the five supplementary roughage mixes, namely 100%Leymus chinensishay (G1), 100%Vigna radiatastalk (G2),L. chinensishay plusSuaeda glauca(G3),V. radiatastalk plusS. glauca(G4) andL. chinensishay plusV. radiatastalk andS. glauca(G5). The results showed that roughage mixes had significant influences on daily roughage intake and daily weight gain of ewes. Ewes had greater daily roughage intake when supplemented with three species of roughage compared to the roughage with one species; however, there was no significant difference between G1 and G2, G3 and G4, or between G4 and G5. The average daily gain of ewes was also greater when they were supplemented with the roughage combination ofL. chinensis,V. radiatastalk andS. glauca. No difference in average daily weight gain was observed between the G4 and G5 treatments (P > 0.05). The lowest average daily weight gain was observed when the ewes were supplemented withV. radiatastalk alone (G2) (P < 0.05). The results indicated that supplying ewes with various roughages simultaneously in winter could improve their forage intake and average daily weight gain compared to offering the ewes only one type of dietary roughage. Further, feeding roughage supplements containing a diverse mix of roughage species represents one method for increasing roughage utilization in livestock production during winter in the pastoral‐farming areas of northeastern China.
Funding Information
  • National Natural Science Foundation of China (31230012, 31201839)

This publication has 43 references indexed in Scilit: