Pupunha heart of palm residue silage as an option of roughage for ruminants

Abstract

It was aimed in this study to evaluate the ensiled pejibaye residue in the feeding of ruminants as roughage. For the in vitro digestibility assay, a randomized block design was used, with four treatments (pejibaye residue without additives; pejibaye residue + banana residue; pejibaye residue + rice residue and pejibaye residue + citrus pulp), with four replications. The variables studied were: chemical composition, specific mass, pH, average particle size, fermentation temperature and fermentative losses. Apparent digestibility was performed with sheep in a completely randomized design, to evaluate the same treatments mentioned above, using five replications. Heart-of-palm pejibaye residue silages showed average particle size, pH and density values within the range appropriate for their manufacture. Among the additives used in this study, silage with 15 g/100g of rice provided improvements in several nutritional parameters, such as DM, NDF, ADF, CF and NDF/NFC. High moisture content impairs the ensiling process, but it was solved with high dry matter content ingredients addition to promote the material stability.

Keywords

• bactris gasipaes
• digestibility
• animal nutrition
• sustainability