Effect of replacing Melastoma (Melastoma affine, D. Don) foliage with Sesbania grandiflora on intake, digestibility and N retention of growing goats

Bui Phan Thu Hang, Vo Lam, Tran Thi Trang, T R Preston* and Inger Ledin**

Angiang University, Faculty of Agriculture and Natural Resources, Vietnam,
bpthang@agu.edu.vn

^*UTA (Colombia), Socorro, Santander, Colombia
** Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, P.O. Box 7024,750 07, Uppsala, Sweden

Abstract

Four male weaned crossbred goats (Bachthao x local female) with an initial weight of 11.9 ± 0.2 kg and aged from 3 to 4 months were used in a 4 x 4 Latin Square design to compare replacement of Melastoma affine foliage with Sesbania grandiflora at four levels: 25%, 50%, 75% and 100%.

Feed intake, apparent digestibility of DM and crude protein, and nitrogen retention increased linearly with increasing replacement of Melastoma by Sesbania.

Key words: Cassava hay, Backthao, legume trees, Mekong delta

Introduction

In the Mekong delta of Vietnam, animal production is based on smallholder farms, and is an important component, indispensable to the integrated farming systems for utilizing locally available resources and generating incomes (Sanh et al 1998). The high increase in the population has created limited access to land, especially grasslands.  Thus the number of goats in the Mekong delta has increased from about 34,700 in the year 2001 to 117,110  in 2004 (Dinh Van Binh  and Nguyen Kim Lin 2005). In the plains of South Vietnam, goats are usually confined or tethered under fruit trees (Nguyen Thi Mui 2005) and are mainly kept for meat. The development of goat production is limited by lack of green feeds during certain times of the year, especially in dry and flood seasons.The natural grasses and crop residues available for ruminant feeds have become scarce. Shortages of feed resources are often a constraint for development of animal production in the tropics and subtropics (Aregheore 2000).

Melastoma affine, a shrub that has high biomass yield of up to37 tonnes/ha (Bui Phan Thu Hang 2005), is abundant in natural conditions and has promising properties as a feed for goats as it is available locally, drought tolerant, and especially well adapted to lowlands and acid sulphate soil areas. The nutritional constraints to Melastoma are the relatively low content of crude protein (11% in DM) and high level of condensed tannins (9.8% in DM) (Bui Phan Thu Hang and Ledin 2005). As a result growth rates of goats fed Melastoma foliage as the main diet were barely above maintenance (6 g/day) (Bui Phan Thu Hang and Ledin 2005). Supplementation with cassava hay at 48% of the diet increased growth rates to 48 g/day (Bui Phan Thu Hang and Ledin 2005).

Sesbania grandiflora has a high crude protein content, is widely adapted to local conditions and supported growth rates in goats of over 100 g/day when given as the sole feed (Nguyen Thi Hong Nhan 1998). Biomass production of Sesbania grandiflora can be as high as 20 tonnes DM/ha in tropical areas (Gill and Patil 1983; Evans and Rotar 1987).

The objective of this study was to evaluate the effect on intake, digestibility, and N retention of growing goats fed increasing levels of Sesbania grandiflora foliage in a basal diet of Melastoma (Melastoma affine, D. Don) foliage.

Materials and methods

The experiment was located in Cantho University Research Farm, Cantho city, Vietnam. Four male weaned crossbred goats (Bachthao x local female) with an initial weight of 11.9 ± 0.2 kg and aged from 3 to 4 months were housed in metabolism cages, de-wormed with Ivomectin, vaccinated (foot-and-mouth disease) and gradually introduced to the experimental feeds (Photo 1) during a 15 day adaptation.
 

The experimental design was a Latin-square, with 4 animals, 4 periods and 4 diets. The diets were:

·        Melastoma foliage ad lib + 0.75% of LW (DM basis) as Sesbania grandiflora foliage  (25S)

·        Melastoma foliage ad lib + 1.5% of LW (DM basis) as Sesbania foliage (50S)

·        Melastoma foliage ad lib + 2.2% of LW (DM basis) as Sesbania foliage (75S)

·        100% Sesbania grandiflora foliage 3% of LW (DM basis) as Sesbania  foliage (100S)

Photo 1: Foliage of Melastoma (left) and Sesbania (right)

The experiment lasted for 93 days with 4 periods consisting of 14 days of adaptation and 7 days of collection of faeces and urine, and 3 days for letting the animals move freely between periods.

Foliages from Melastoma affine and Sesbania grandiflora were hung in bunches above the feed trough. Amounts offered were based on live weight at the start of each period. The Melastoma foliage was fed at 130% of the individual average daily intake the previous week. Feed offered for each goat was weighed every morning and the animals were fed with 50% of their daily ration at 08:00 in the morning and 50% at 14:00 in the afternoon. Fresh water and a mineral lick were always available.       

Foliages of Melastoma and Sesbania  were analysed for DM, CP, NDF, ADF and ash before the start of the experiment. During the sample collection period, feed refusals (Melastoma and Sesbania grandiflora foliage), faeces, and urine were taken from individual animals, weighed every morning and pooled for 7 days to provide a representative sample for each goat and analysed for DM, CP, NDF, ADF and ash. The animals were weighed before commencement of the adaptation period and before feeding in the morning on the first and last day of each collection period. The DM, CP and ash were determined according to AOAC (1990). NDF and ADF were determined according to the method of Goering and Van Soest (1970), using sodium sulphate and amylase and expressed with residual ash.

All raw data of the experiment were computed and stored in worksheets of the Excel Software Release XP version and processed by analysis of variance using the General Linear Model (GLM) procedure of Minitab Software Release version 13.1 (Minitab 2000). Sources of variation in the model were: diets, animals, periods and error

Results and discussion

The DM content of Melastoma (Table 1) was slightly higher than in Sesbania grandiflora, but the CP content was much lower. Cell wall components were also lower in Sesbania.

Increasing the rate of replacement of Melastoma by Sesbania (Table 3) led to linear increases in feed intake (Table 2), in apparent digestibility of DM, organic matter and crude protein (Table 3) and in retention of nitrogen (Table 3; Figure 1), but no change in digestibility of cell wall components (Table 3).

Figure 1: Relationship between S. grandiflora intake (% of total DM intake) and N retention (g/day)

Figure 2. Relationship between live weight gain and proportion of cassava hay in the diet of goats fed foliage of Melastoma (from Bui Phan Thu Hang and Ledin 2005)

These results are similar to those observed earlier when cassava hay replaced up to 48% of the diet of goats fed fresh Melastoma foliage (Figure 2). The high N retention of 5 g/day (equivalent to a growth rate of over 100 g/day) is supported by the report of Nguyen Thi Hong Nhan (1998) in which Sesbania grandiflora as the sole feed supported growth rates exceeding 100 g/day.  Dahlanuddin (2003) also showed, that in Lombak Island in Indonesia, the growth rate of goats fed Sesbania grandiflora exceeded that of goats fed other leguminous tree foliages and / or grasses.

References

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