PERFORMANCE OF YANKASA RAMS FED TREATED AND UNTREATED SORGHUM STOVER WITH DIFFERENT SUPPLEMENTS

Abstract

An experiment was conducted to evaluate nutrient intake, digestibility and performance of growing Yankasa rams fed urea treated and untreated sorghum stover with supplementation. Twenty rams were randomly allotted to four dietary treatmentsin complete randomized design. Animals on treatment 1 and 2 were fed untreated sorghum stover while those on 3 and 4 were given treated sorghum stover. Treatment 1 and 3 were supplemented with cotton seed cake (CSC alone) while those on treatment 2 and 4 were supplemented with cotton seed cake and maize bran (CSC+MB 50:50) the experiment lasted for 63 days. The result indicated that urea treatment increased crude protein (CP) content of sorghum stover by 219% and decreased acid detergent fibre 21.57%. Significant (P<0.05) difference were observed in nutrient intake and growth performance. The result of dry matter intake (DMI) was higher in treatment 1 and lowest in 4 with (576.10 g/day and 513.64 g/day respectively). Live weight gain were significantly (P<0.05) affected by the treatments with treatment 3 having the highest value of 78.89g/day and treatment 2 the least 57.46g/day. Animal fed diet 3 utilized their diet much better compared to others. It may therefore be concluded that urea treatment and supplementation of sorghum stover can improve performance. However diet 3 which gave a better average daily gain is recommended for growing Yankasa rams.