Journal of Animal and Veterinary Advances

Year: 2008
Volume: 7
Issue: 11
Page No. 1467 - 1473

Performance and Carcass Characteristics of Intact Zebu Bulls Fed Different Levels of Deep Stacked Poultry Litter

Authors : Nuha Hamed Talib and Faisal Awad Ahmed

Abstract: The objective of this research was to study the effect of feeding diets of Deep-stacked Broiler Litter (DBL) on growth, dry matter intake, feed conversion ratio and carcass composition in Baggara cattle raised for 14 weeks. Thirty six Sudan Zebu intact bulls with 166.7�9.71 kg initial body weight were assigned in a randomized complete design to 1 of 4 dietary treatment groups that differed in DBL as a percentage of concentrate diet. The percentages in concentrate diet were 0, 20, 40 and 60%. Growth in term of total gain and daily gain was not affected by inclusion of processed litter in concentrate diet up to 40%. At higher inclusion rate (60%) both total gain and daily gain dropped (p<0.01). Dry matter intake was not affected by feeding processed litter (p>0.05) and so palatability. Feed conversion ratio deteriorated with increasing inclusion rate of DBL and became significantly lower at (p<0.05) at 60% inclusion rate. Dressing percentage was not affected by dietary treatments. Non carcass components as a percentage of empty body weight was affected differently by dietary treatments but generally tended to be heavier in slaughtered bulls fed poultry litter and that was reflected in that carcass weight in kg in term of empty body weight either hot or cold was lighter (p<0.001) in those bulls. The fat reservoir in body tissues tended to be lower in animal fed DBL than others and that resulted in less insulation of carcass and higher chiller shrinkage percentages. Whole sale cuts from bulls fed different levels of DBL as a percent of cold side weight were not affected by different dietary treatments. The previously mentioned results indicate that DBL could be safely used as a feed ingredient for bulls without any effect on animal health. Inclusion of DBL in concentrate diets produced acceptable growth rates of bulls with compromisable prices. That reasonable growth rate achieved in this study suggest that fattening mature Baggara bulls do not need high energy diets and a very small amount of bypass protein produces a reasonable growth; saving high quality protein for other types of production.

How to cite this article:

Nuha Hamed Talib and Faisal Awad Ahmed , 2008. Performance and Carcass Characteristics of Intact Zebu Bulls Fed Different Levels of Deep Stacked Poultry Litter. Journal of Animal and Veterinary Advances, 7: 1467-1473.

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