Objective: The aim of this experiment was to determine the effect of feeding pineapple waste silage (PWS) as the source of roughage replaced in Napier grass silage (NGS) on the nutrient intakes, energy status, and growth performances of growing Myanmar local cattle. Materials and methods: Eight growing Myanmar local cattle were randomly allocated into two groups, which were adjusted for age, sex, and body weight. Treatments were control (70% NGS + 30% concentrate) and PWS (45% NGS + 25% PWS + 30% concentrate). This experiment lasted for 6 weeks, including adaptation, and feed intake, energy status, and body weight gain were measured. Results: The higher ( p < 0.05) intakes of dry matter, crude protein, non-fiber carbohydrate, neutral detergent fiber and energy, and energy balance were observed in the PSW group than in the control group. Although the initial and final body weights of both groups were not different ( p > 0.05), the body weight gain and average daily gain were significantly higher ( p < 0.05) in the PSW group than in the control group. Feeding PWS as a roughage source at 25% of diet improved the nutrient intake, energy balance, and body weight gain of growing Myanmar local cattle. Conclusion: Thus, PWS could be used as the source of roughage replaced in NGS in Myanmar local cattle with the improvement of productive performances.

Ruminants can achieve high productivity when the diet includes concentrates; however these are often expensive due to competition with humans and mono-gastric animals. This experiment was conducted to determine the effect of partial inclusion of Albizia saman pods (ASP) in a Commercial Concentrate (CC) on the performances of dairy cows. Twelve cross-bred Holstein Friesian cows (472±13 kg) in the 12th week of lactation were randomly allocated into four treatment groups with three replicates accoding to the completely randomized design. The four treatments were control diet-CD [35% urea-treated-rice-straw (URS; 79g crude protein (CP)/ kg dry matter (DM)) and 65% CC (contained 40% cottonseed cake, 35% broken chickpea and 25% chickpea husk on an as fed basis and provided 200g CP/kg DM)], D1[35% URS + 60% CC + 5% ASP (189g CP/kg DM)], D2 (35% URS +55% CC + 10% ASP) and D3 (35% URS + 50% CC + 15% ASP). Cows were fed treatments for 60 days. Dry matter intake was significantly higher (p<0.05) for cows in the D3 treatment compared with the other three treatments, however there were no significant differences in the DM digestibility of treatments. Nitrogen intake and faecal-nitrogen of cows offered the D3 treatment were significantly higher (p<0.05) than those of cows offered the other three treatments. In contrast urine-nitrogen and nitrogen utilization were not significantly different among the treatments. The average milk yield (4% fat-corrected-milk) increased as the percentage of ASP was increased in the diets, however the composition of milk did not differ significantly between treatments. The costs of TDN/kg and per kg of milk was highest for the CD treatment and the lowest was found in D3 treatment (p<0.05). These results suggest that Albizia saman pods could be replace up to 15% of the commercial concentrate fed to lactating Holstein Friesian cross-bred cows without detrimental effects.

This experiment was conducted to determine the effects of dietary supplementation of rice distiller dried grain (rDDG) on growth performance and digestibility of growing pigs. Fifteen growing pigs (30±1.3 kg) were assigned into 5 groups with 3 replicates, supplied with diet including different levels of rDDG 0% (rDDG-00), 5% (rDDG-5), 10% (rDDG-10), 15% (rDDG-15) and 20% (rDDG-20) respectively for 10 weeks. Free assess to water with nipples were provided for pigs. Weekly cumulative feed intake, body weight gain and feed conversion ratio (FCR) were estimated. Also, feed digestibility and feed cost per kg of feed and body weight were determined. The rDDG possessed a high crude protein (50.19%) and energy content (3005 Kcal/kg). Cumulative feed intake were not significantly different, however, body weight gain of pigs from rDDG-15 and rDDG-20 groups were significantly lower than the other groups at week-10. Lower cumulative feed conversion ratios (FCR) were observed in pigs from rDDG-05 and rDDG-10 in comparison with rDDG-00, rDDG-15 and rDDG-20 at week-8, 9 and 10. The digestibility of experimental feeds was not significantly different between groups. The feed cost was reduced about 30 MMK/kg feed for every 5% increasing of rDDG inclusion in diet. The lowest feed costs per kg BW were observed in rDDG-05 and rDDG-10 and followed by rDDG-15, rDDG-20 and rDDG-00. Thus, dietary supplementation of rice distiller dried grain (rDDG) up to 10% of diet improved growth performance and decreased feed cost per kg of body weight of growing pigs.

This study consisted of two experiments conducted to evaluate the effective net gas, fermentation kinetics (experiment 1), methane gas concentration, partitioning factor (PF) for microbial protein synthesis and in vitro dry matter digestibility (IVDMD) (experiment 2) of conventional diets commonly fed to dairy cows in Central Myanmar. The conventional diets from four areas [diet from Sin Tel area (Diet-ST), diet from Myay Nguarea (Diet-MN), diet from Ta Pelarea (Diet-TP) and diet from Amarapuraarea (Diet-AM)] were used as experimental diets in this study. In most of conventional diets, rice straw, sorghum stover and natural grass were used as roughage source and cotton seed cake and broken rice were used as concentrate. However in some diets, sesame residue and butter bean residue were used as roughage source instead of sorghum stover and natural grass. The roughage to concentrate ratio and crude protein (CP) content of conventional diets ranged from 53:47 to 72:28 and 11.46 to 17.96%, respectively. In experiment 1,the effective net gas volume of Diet-TP was lower (p<0.05) than Diet-ST and Diet-AM and generally, the fermentation kinetics (a, b, c and a+b) of Diet-TP were also lower than those of other diets. In the experiment 2, the lower value (p<0.05) of short chain fatty acid (SCFA) was found in Diet-MN and Diet-TP while the higher values (p<0.05) of metabolizable energy (ME) and organic matter digestibility (OMD) were observed Diet-AM and Diet-TP. Although methane gas concentration of Diet-TP was higher(p<0.05) than those of other diets, the greater values of IVDMD and PF were observed in Diet-TP. According to these findings, it was perceived that all conventional diets have different nutritional qualities which are useful for production and health of dairy cows; however the Diet-TP possessed the highest nutritional qualities among the conventional diets.

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S orghum is becoming important forage especially in tropical regions because of its adaptability to environments with limited rainfall, high temperature and low soil fertility, and acceptable energy values and relatively high apparent dry matter degradability (>600g/kg DM) (Carbal Filho et al., 2005). Considerations with forage shortage during summer time, forage were conserved through the fermentation process of ensiling. However, the difficulty in ensiling of tropical forages is low concentration of WSC (McDonald et al., 1991), which resulted in lower fermentation quality, intake, and digestibility. Thus, the additives such as fermentation stimulants, fermentation inhibitors, aerobic deterioration inhibitors, nutrients and absorbents should be used to obtain the good quality silage. Whole-crop cereal silages, such as corn and sorghum, are susceptible to aerobic deterioration, especially in warm climates (Filya, 2003). This is due to aerobic yeasts which are most active at 20-30˚C (Ashbell et al., 2002). Therefore, it is very important to find suitable additives that inhibit fungi and protect the silage against aerobic exposure. Among the several silage additives, molasses is the well-known additive for ensiling, and the fermented juice of epiphytic lactic acid bacteria (FJLB) is also the technique which has the ability to increase the silage quality of tropical forages. Lukkananukool et al. (2018) stated that FJLB can be research Article Abstract | This study was conducted to determine the effect of fermented juice of epiphytic lactic acid bacteria (FJLB) and molasses addition on the fermentation characteristics and nutrient compositions of sorghum silage. Sorghums were chopped into pieces of 1-2 cm length and molasses 5% (w/w) and FJLB 1% (v/w) of fresh material were added as silage additives. No significant effects on physical characteristics except pH, lowest in molasses silage, were noted. The higher organic matter and lower fibre contents were observed in molasses silage. Total carbohydrate, non fibre carbohydrate, total digestible nutrients, digestible dry matter and dry matter intake were highest in molasses silage. The higher acetic, propionic and lactic acid concentrations were observed in FJLB silage. The lactic acid bacteria (LAB) count was highest in FJLB silage, and lowest in control silage. The low volatile based nitrogen (VBN) and high V-score, indicators of good quality silages, were generally observed in molasses and FJLB rather than control silages. This experiment indicated that FJLB can be alternatively used as additive instead of using molasses in sorghum silage; however more inclusion level of molasses and FJLB should be used to ensure good quality silage.

A greenhouse pot-experiment was conducted to evaluate the phytoremediation abilities of three tropical pasture grasses (signalgrass, napiergrass and atratum) in response to two types of soils (Kunigami-maji and Shimajiri-maji) contaminated with three levels of lead (0, 150 and 300 mg kg -1 ). The results demonstrated that the dry biomass, lead concentration and the accumulated amounts were different among the plant species and between the soil types. The amounts of dry matter in three tropical pasture grasses grown on Kunigamimaji soil were higher than that on Shimajiri-maji soil. On both soils, lead concentration of roots was higher than that of shoots, and it was suggested that transportation of lead from roots to shoots was restricted in these plants. The lead accumulated amounts per plant grown on Kunigami-maji soil were higher than that on Shimajiri-maji soil. And, on Kunigami-maji soil, accumulation of lead was relatively high in both shoots and roots of signalgrass and atratum, while, in napiergrass, the high level of lead was found only in roots. Amounts of lead extracted from the shoots of signalgrass, napiergrass and atratum grown on Kunigami-maji soil contaminated with the highest lead level of 300 mg kg -1 were 1.64, 0.17 and 0.92 mg plant -1 , respectively. As Kunigami-maji had lower soil pH than Shimajiri-maji, it can be suggested that lower soil pH may enhance lead bioavailability and uptake by the tropical pasture grasses. In conclusion, signalgrass and atratum could be useful for phytoremediation of lead contaminated soil, especially on Kunigami-maji soil.

Academic PublishersAdvances in Animal and Veterinary Sciences April 2019 | Volume 7 | Issue 4 | Page 272With the targets of reducing the feed cost and sustaining good performances of animals, the researchers tried to replace the high quality exotic grass into low quality local Research ArticleAbstract | This experiment was conducted to evaluate the in vitro fermentation parameters of grass based diet supplemented with two different tree legume forages in ruminants. The grass [Mulato II (M)] was mixed with legume forages [Gliricidia(G) and Sesbaenia (S)] to obtain the feed mixtures, M70%+G30%, M70%+S30% and M70%+G15%+S15%, and then carried out the in vitro gas production. The lower (p<0.05) crude protein and higher (p<0.05) fibre (neutral detergent fibre and acid detergent fibre) contents were observed in Mulato II compared with legume forages, and M70+G30 had the highest (p<0.05) fibre content among the feed mixtures. The significant differences (p<0.05) in gas productions were observed in early incubation times (1, 6 and 12h). The higher fermentation parameters were found in Gliricidia. For the feed mixtures, no significant differences (p>0.05) in gas production and fermentation kinetics were observed. The nutritive values such as metabolizable energy, organic matter digestibility, short chain fatty acid, total digestible nutrient and digestible dry matter were higher (p<0.05) in Sesbaenia than other feedstuffs. The dry matter intake of M70+S30 was significantly higher (p<0.05) than that of M70+G30 and M70+G15+S15. However, all feedstuffs and feed mixtures possessed the nutritive values of high quality forages and complete feeds for ruminants. The highest (p<0.05) methane concentration was observed in Sesbaenia, followed by Gliricidia and Mulato II. For the feed mixtures, M70+G15+S15 showed the higher (p<0.05) methane gas concentration than M70+G30 and M70+S30. The negative correlation (R 2 =0.9252) between NDF content and methane gas concentration of feedstuffs was observed. Thus, grass and legume forage mixtures have potential to use as complete feed for ruminant without using concentrates because of their higher nutritive values. In consideration with environmental issue, M70+G15+S15 feed mixture should not be used as ruminant feed because of its higher concentration of methane.