Using pineapple shoots as roughage for growing sheep
 

Pham Trong Dai, Nguyen Kim Lin, Dinh Hong Quang and Nguyen Thi Mui*

Goat and Rabbit Research Center, Son tay, Ha tay, Vietnam
 

18 weaned lambs at 3.0 to 3.5 months of age and 11-12 kg of body weight (BW) were used in a completely randomized design with 6 replications per treatment. The treatments were urea treated rice straw (UTR) fed ad libitum + cassava hay at 1% of BW (UTR-CH); pineapple foliage ad libitum + cassava hay at 1% of BW (PF-CH) and UTR fed ad libitum + pineapple foliage ad libitum + cassava hay at 1% of BW (PF-UTR-CH)

Pineapple foliage contained 192 g DM/kg, 67 g CP/kg DM and 476 g NDF/kg DM. The live weight gain (LWG) of growing lambs was 52.9, 43.1 and 50.4 g/day for UTR-CH, PF-CH and PF-UTR-CH, respectively. The DM intake was higher in treatment UTR-CH (39 g/kg BW) and PF-UTR-CH (42 g/kg BW) compared to PF-CH treatment (23 g/kg BW). The feed cost per kg live weight was 23500, 22600 and 27100 VND for UTR-CH, PF-CH and PF-UTR-CH, respectively.

In conclusion, pineapple foliage could be used as roughage for sheep in the dry season.

 Key words: pineapple foliage, urea treated rice straw, cassava hay, growing lamb.