Twenty-four intact male Bonga lambs were studied in a 100-day experiment to evaluate the effect of feeding tannin rich leaves of Albizia gummifera (AG) on nutrient utilization, growth performance, and carcass composition. The dietary treatments consisted of hay alone (T1, control), AG at 30 % of control diet + T1 (T2), and T2 + polyethylene glycol 6000 (PEG) (T3, 40 mg PEG, 1 kg AG/head on a dry mass (DM) basis. The lambs were individually fed at 50 g DM/kg live weight. In the last 10 days of the experiment, all animals from each treatment were harnessed with feces collection bags. At the end of the experiment, lambs were slaughtered after overnight fasting for measurements of carcass characteristics. Crude protein, neutral detergent fiber, and condensed tannin contents of AG were 300, 586, and 108 g/kg DM, respectively. Lambs fed AG with PEG had higher (P < 0.001) feed intake, digestibility, carcass weight, and weight gain compared with other treatments. Although lambs fed diet T2 were able to utilize AG, the efficiency of its utilization was lower (P < 0.001) than the PEG-treated groups. The improvement in nutrient intake and digestibility, carcass weight, and growth performance of lambs supplemented with PEG emphasizes the negative effect of tannins on livestock performance. Leaves of AG enhance digestibility and performance in tropical hay-fed sheep, and the addition of PEG further improves this effect, likely due to the binding of tannins.

This study was conducted in Esera district Dawuro zone Southern Ethiopia with the objectives of assessing small ruminant production system. For the study one hundred thirty eight (HHs) owning small ruminant were selected randomly and semi-structured questionnaire was used to collect data on small ruminants' production system, management, reproductive performances and availability of feed resources .The available feed resources are (a grass species, crop aftermath and 4 legumes species are the common ones). The average family size was 5.23 ± 0.195 per HH. Crop-livestock farming was the commonly used farming system (100%) with (69.1%) extensive and (30.9%) semi-intensive production system. The mean total land holding was 3.1288 ± 0.19 ha per HH and was significant (P<0.05) varied across agro-ecologies. The average sheep and goat flock size per HH was 6.08 ± 0.183 and 5.69 ± 0.236 respectively and was significantly (p<0.05) varied across agro-ecologies. The purpose of keeping small ruminants in District was for cash income, as an insurance, meat, manure and as means of wealth accumulation with index of 0.32, 0.29, 0.16, 0.13 and 0.08 respectively. Natural mating is the most widely used in their breeding practice almost (100%) in HL (High land), ML (Mid land), and LL (Low land). Grazing and browsing on natural pasture and leguminous tree species are commonly used in their feeding system. Majority (80.7%) of HHs are keeping small ruminants in their living house. The source of water used for their animals and themselves as well is from river, tap, rain and harvested water depending on the season. Internal and external parasites are the first and second ranking diseases and parasites which affects the small ruminants in the study area. For sheep, estimated average puberty age is (6.6 ± 0.12 months for male and 7.7 ± 0.16 months for female), age for first lambing (12.7 ± 0.16 month) and lambing interval (8.4 ± 0.17 month) were significantly Higher (P<0.05) in the HL than in ML and LL. For Goats, estimated average puberty age is (7.04 ± 0.10 months for male and 7.40 ± 0.10 months for female), first Kidding age is (13.04 ± 0.16 months) and lambing interval (8.5 ± 0.12 months) were significantly Higher (P<0.05) in the HL than in ML and LL agro ecology. The major opportunity of small ruminant production is that they requires short generation interval, high market demand smaller space and capital investment with index of 0.26, 0.24 and 0.23 respectively and the major constraints of small ruminant productions were Disease and parasite, feed shortage, insufficient grazing land were the major complaints told by our respondents.

The purpose of this research was to determine the impact of seasonality on feed balance in the Lalo kile district of the Kellem Wollega Zone of Western Ethiopia. The district was divided into two agro-ecological zones: mid and low altitude. A total of 127 respondents were chosen to be interviewed. To collect the required data in the study areas, a cross-sectional survey was used. To analyses the qualitative data, descriptive statistics were performed, while the General Linear Model (GLM) method was used to assess the impacts of seasonal feed availability and agro-ecology on dry matter yield and production constraints. The result showed that there has been seasonal fluctuation in the feed availability and the feed is generally abundant from June to September. The feed supply in terms of DM, ME, and DCP per household per year was 118.7 kg, 74,781 MJ/kg, and 118.61kg, respectively. The feed balance was negatively associated and substantially different all across the studied areas (P < 0.01). With a year's approach, the annual total feed supply exceeds only 66.13, 25.81, and 87.24 percent of the DM, DCP, and ME demands per household, respectively. As a result, total dry matter production, digestible crude protein, and metabolizable energy supply were only fulfilled for 9, 3.5, and 12 months in the research area's mid-altitude and 7, 3 and 9 months in the study area's low land altitude, respectively. The main limitations in both agro-ecologies of the research area include low production and reproduction, poor use of existing feedstuffs, and poor adoption of improved forage production. As a result, for successful livestock development in the study area, the adoption of better fodder and supplementation of productive animals should be considered.

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