Studies on the skin and wool fibres of Barki sheep fed on protected lysine and methionine

Abstract

The amount of available amino acids containing sulfur is one of the most important nutritional factors that affect the production and quality of wool. Degradation of feed proteins in the rumen prevents food supply to the sheep organism with large quantities of these amino acids. Proteins that avoid bacterial hydrolysis in the rumen (undegradable protein), increase the wool production through the increase in supplying the organism with amino acids, especially cystine, which is a limiting factor for the production of wool. Also, Jovanović et al. (2001) added that, the infusion of cystine into abomasum or blood can double the growth of wool, while the infusion of methionine increases the wool growth by providing sulfur for the synthesis of cysteine.