Diets with low forage concentration may depress feed intake and average daily gain, while diets with high forage concentration may limit feed intake due to rumen filling. Adequate forage level may range from 7% to 14% in ration for feedlot lambs, depending on forage source and ingredient composition. Small amounts of good quality forage may improve growth performance of sheep in the first stage...

Fifty-six mature Polypay ewes were used in two experiments to examine the effects of feeding a high-grain diet at a restricted intake on milk production and composition, lamb performance and out-of-season breeding. Ewes were fed either a high-grain diet (85% concentrate and 15% forage) or a high-forage diet. The high-forage diets were 68% forage and 32% concentrate in Experiment 1 and 80% forag...

The use of bioactive tanniniferous plants seems a promising alternative to control infections parasitic nematodes of the gastro intestinal tract in small ruminants. Both in vitro and in vivo studies, have confirmed the anthelmintic properties of several forage legumes, or tropical and browse plants. The aim of the present study was to evaluate the in vitro anthelmintic (AH) effect of 3 Tunisian...

Waterlogging is one of the major factors limiting the productivity of pastures in the humid tropics. Brachiaria humidicola is a forage grass commonly used in zones prone to temporary waterlogging. Brachiaria humidicola accessions adapt to waterlogging by increasing aerenchyma in nodal roots above constitutive levels to improve oxygenation of root tissues. In some accessions, waterlogging reduce...

The voluntary intake (VI) of separated leaf and stem fractions of a grass and legume (Panicum maximum and Lablab purpureus respectively) was determined using Hereford steers fistulated at the rumen and oesophagus. VI of leaf fractions was higher than that of the stem fraction (8.23 v. 3.67 kg/d, P less than 0.001) while that for the legume diets was higher than for the grass diets (6.65 v. 5.22...